Headline findings

Reported DCMS Sector GVA is estimated to have fallen by 0.4% from Quarter 2 (April to June) to Quarter 3 2022 (July to September) in real terms. By comparison, the whole UK economy fell by 0.2% from Quarter 2 to Quarter 3 2022.

GVA of reported DCMS Sectors in September 2022 was 6% above February 2020 levels, which was the most recent month not significantly affected by the pandemic. By comparison, GVA for the whole UK economy was 0.2% lower than in February 2020.

Released

16 November 2022

About this release

Monthly estimates

These Economic Estimates are Official Statistics used to provide an estimate of the economic contribution of DCMS Sectors in terms of gross value added (GVA), for the period January 2019 to September 2022. Provisional monthly GVA in 2019 and 2020 was first published in March 2021 as an ad hoc statistical release. This current release contains new figures for July to September 2022 and revised estimates for previous months, in line with the scheduled revisions that were made to the underlying ONS datasets in October 2022.

Estimates are in chained volume measures (i.e. have been adjusted for inflation), at 2019 prices, and are seasonally adjusted. These latest monthly estimates should only be used to illustrate general trends, not used as definitive figures.

You can use these estimates to:

• Look at relative indicative changes in GVA over time for DCMS sectors and subsectors

You should not use these estimates to:

• Quantify GVA for a specific month
• Measure absolute change in GVA over time
• Determine findings for DCMS sectors that are defined using more detailed industrial classes (due to the data sources only being available at broader industry levels)

“Summed monthly” Annual GVA

Estimates of annual GVA by DCMS Sectors, based on the monthly series, are included in this release for 2019 to 2021. These are calculated by summing the monthly estimates for the calendar year and were first published for 2019 and 2020 in DCMS Sector National Economic Estimates: 2011 - 2020.

Since August 2022, we have been publishing these estimates as part of the regular published series of GVA data, with data being revised in line with revisions to the underlying ONS datasets, as with the monthly GVA estimates. These estimates have been published, updating what was first published last year, in order to meet growing demand for annual figures for GVA beyond the 2019 estimates in our National Statistics GVA publication. The National Statistics GVA publication estimates remain the most robust for our sectors, however estimates for years after 2019 have been delayed owing to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

Consequently, these “summed monthly” annual estimate figures for GVA can be used but should not be seen as definitive.

Data sources

The findings are calculated based on published ONS data sources including the Index of Services and Index of Production.

These data sources provide an estimate of the monthly change in GVA for all UK industries. However, the data is only available for broader industry groups, whereas DCMS sectors are defined at a more detailed industrial level. For example, GVA for ‘Cultural education’ is estimated based on the trend for all education. Sectors such as ‘Cultural education’ may have been affected differently by COVID-19 compared to education in general. These estimates are also based on the composition of the economy in 2019. Overall, this means the accuracy of monthly GVA for DCMS sectors is likely to be lower for months in 2020 and 2021.

The technical guidance contains further information about data sources, methodology, and the validation and accuracy of these estimates.

Revisions

Figures are provisional and subject to revision on a monthly basis when the ONS Index of Services and Index of Production are updated. Figures for the latest month will be highly uncertain.

An example of the impact of these revisions is highlighted in the following example; for the revisions applied in February 2022 the average change to DCMS sector monthly GVA was 0.6%, but there were larger differences for some sectors, in some months e.g. the value of the Sport sector in May 2021 was revised from £1.

Content

The Creative Industries Focus on reports expand on the Creative Industries Economic Estimates published in January 2016.

“Creative Industries: Focus on Employment” covers the number of jobs in the Creative Industries and the Creative Economy in 2015, and is broken down by a number of characteristics, including:

• region or devolved administration
• highest level of qualification
• gender
• ethnicity
• socio-economic classification

“Creative Industries: Focus on Exports of Services” covers the value of exports of services for the UK Creative Industries in 2014, broken down by Creative Industries grouping and export market.

The UK Statistics Authority

This release is published in accordance with the Code of Practice for Official Statistics (2009), as produced by the UK Statistics Authority. The Authority has the overall objective of promoting and safeguarding the production and publication of official statistics that serve the public good. It monitors and reports on all official statistics, and promotes good practice in this area. The responsible statisticians for these releases are Penny Allen (0207 211 2380) and Becky Woods (0207 211 6134). For further details about the estimates, or to be added to a distribution list for future updates, please email Penny or Becky at evidence@culture.gov.uk.

Pre-release access

The document above contains a list of ministers and officials who have received privileged early access to this release. In line with best practice, the list has been kept to a minimum and those given access for briefing purposes had a maximum of 24 hours.

​This publication has been updated on 20 June 2016 and 4 July 2016 to correct data in the statistical release Creative Industries: Focus on Employment published on 9 June 2016.

Amendments on 20 June: The percentage of BAME within the UK Economy was incorrectly reported on page 21. This has now been corrected in the PDF document to 11.3 per cent. There are no changes to any other figures in this report or other documents on this page.

Amendments on 4 July: The 2011 total in Table 1 and Table 2 was incorrectly reported and should be 1,562,000. This has been corrected in the accompanying tables. The chart in Figure 8 was showing data for the Creative Economy rather than the Creative Industries. This has now been corrected.

These Creative Industries Economic Estimates are Official Statistics used to measure the direct economic contribution of the Creative Industries to the UK Economy. An analysis of the contribution made by the Creative Industries to UK Employment, GVA and Exports of Services has been provided in this release. These estimates have been produced using ONS National Statistics sources.

Content

This release covers the gross value added (GVA) of the creative industries, and their contribution to the UK economy, including:

• Advertising and marketing
• Architecture
• Crafts
• Product design, graphic design and fashion design
• Film, TV, video, radio and photography
• IT, software and computer services
• Publishing
• Museums, galleries and libraries
• Music, performing arts and visual arts

The UK Statistics Authority

This release is published in accordance with the Code of Practice for Official Statistics (2009), as produced by the UK Statistics Authority. The Authority has the overall objective of promoting and safeguarding the production and publication of official statistics that serve the public good. It monitors and reports on all official statistics, and promotes good practice in this area. The responsible statistician for this release is Niall Goulding (020 7211 6085). For further details about the estimates, or to be added to a distribution list for future updates, please email us at evidence@culture.gov.uk.

Pre-release access

The document above contains a list of ministers and officials who have received privileged early access to this release. In line with best practice, the list has been kept to a minimum and those given access for briefing purposes had a maximum of 24 hours.

About

These economic estimates are National Statistics providing an estimate of the contribution of DCMS Sectors to the UK economy, measured by the number of businesses.

Headline findings

DCMS

In March 2023 there were 584,920 businesses in the included DCMS sectors, a decrease of 3,245 (0.6%) from March 2022. This is compared to a decrease of 1.5% in UK registered businesses overall.

In March 2023 the vast majority (87.3%) of businesses in included DCMS sectors fell into the micro (0 to 9) employment band, a slightly lower proportion than for UK registered businesses in general (89.1%).

In March 2023, 79.5% of included DCMS sector businesses had a turnover of less than £250,000, a higher proportion than for UK businesses in general (68.1%).

Digital sector

There were 200,600 businesses in the digital sector, a decrease of 9,090 (4.3%) from March 2022. This is compared to a decrease of 1.5% in UK registered businesses overall.

The vast majority (91.9%) of businesses in the digital sector fell into the micro (0 to 9) employment band, a slightly higher proportion than for UK registered businesses in general (89.1%).

In March 2023, 78.3% of digital sector businesses had a turnover of less than £250,000, a higher proportion than for UK businesses in general (68.1%).

Content

These statistics cover the contributions of the following DCMS sectors to the UK economy;

• creative industries
• cultural sector
• gambling
• sport
• tourism (defined in this release as the tourism industries)

Users should note that there is overlap between DCMS sector definitions. Estimates are not available for the civil society sector, because they are not identifiable in the data source used for this release.

These statistics also cover the contributions of the digital sector and telecoms to the UK economy. Users should note telecoms sits wholly within the digital sector.

The release also includes estimates for the audio visual sector, which is not a DCMS sector or digital sector but is “adjacent” to them and includes some industries also common to DCMS and digital sectors.

A definition for each sector is available in the published data tables.

Recent changes to this release

We have made a number of changes to DCMS and digital sector economic estimates: business demographics in recent years:

• previous reports have included data on charities registered with the Charity Commission of England and Wales, Community Interest Companies (CICs) and the now-discontinued Public Service Mutuals which were defined as civil society organisations
• previous releases have included estimates of the turnover produced by businesses in each employment band and the number of businesses by foreign-owned status, both of which are not available in this release due to the change in data source from the Annual Business Survey (ABS) to the Inter-Departmental Business Register (IDBR)

Additional information about the change in data source from the ABS to the IDBR in 2022 can be found in the source data change summary note.

We welcome any views on these changes at evidence@dcms.gov.uk.

Released

These statistics were first published on 16 November 2023.

The UK Statistics Authority

DCMS economic estimates are https://osr.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/accredited-official-statistics/" class="govuk-link">accredited official statistics and published in accordance with the standards of trustworthiness, quality and value in the https://code.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/" class="govuk-link">Code of Practice for Statistics, produced by the UK Statistics Authority (UKSA). Accredited official statistics are called National Statistics in the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007. These official statistics were independently reviewed by the Office for