Alberta Real Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for Agri-Food Industries, 2015

GDP is the total unduplicated value of goods and services produced in a region during a given year. GDP of an industry equals the output by the industry minus the value of intermediate inputs that were purchased from other industries, domestic or foreign. This Update presents “real GDP” which provides a measurement of economic performance changing over time, excluding the effects of price changes. An increase in GDP is a sign of a healthy economy while a decline indicates that the economy is not functioning to its full capacity.

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Key Messages

• As measured by real Gross Domestic Product, Alberta’s economy fell 4.0 per cent to $294.7 billion in 2015, after growing 4.5 per cent in 2014. The downward trend was largely due to lower oil prices which contributed to a decline in support activities for oil and gas extraction, and a decrease in oil and gas engineering construction. This also impacted the construction sector, which fell 16.7 per cent to $29.6 billion.
• Alberta’s agri-food industries (primary agriculture industries and food and beverage manufacturing industries) remained resilient, generating $5.4 billion in GDP in 2015 (practically unchanged from 2014).
• Food manufacturing industries grew 5.4 per cent to a record $2.4 billion in 2015. This was the third consecutive growth since 2013. However, moderating the 2015 increase were agriculture industries which declined 4.3 per cent to $3.0 billion, largely due to dry conditions in Alberta.
• Contributing to the latest increase were gains in animal food manufacturing, grain and oilseed milling, miscellaneous food manufacturing, and meat product manufacturing.