GVA by industry

GVA by sector in the North East

Total GVA in the North East in 2021 was about £42.2 billion. Using an 18-industry breakdown, the manufacturing sector made the single largest contribution to North East GVA, accounting for over £6.7 billion of the total in 2021. Five other sectors contributed over £3 billion in the same year, in order from largest to smallest these were; real estate, health and social work, wholesale and retail, education, and public administration.

Nearly every sector increased its total output between 2020 and 2021 as the North East economy recovered from the Covid-19 pandemic. The largest increases in absolute terms were in manufacturing and wholesale and retail, both sectors that were particularly disrupted by Covid-19 related measures. 

The changes by sector compared to 2014 were similar but with an emphasis on some different sectors. Again, all sectors apart from three saw growth over the period, but the largest increase in absolute terms was in the health and social care sector. Manufacturing saw the second largest increase over this period followed by education which saw the third largest.
 

Comparisons between areas

Compared with England excluding London, a higher proportion of GVA in the North East is accounted for by manufacturing and public services (including health, education and public administration). A lower proportion is accounted for by the services sector, especially across professional, scientific and technical activities, information and communication and finance and insurance. The North East also has a smaller proportion of GVA from retail and wholesale.

Broadly the sector changes between 2020 and 2021 were similar in England excluding London and the North East, with sectors such as accommodation and the arts seeing the strongest recoveries in percentage terms.

There was variation at the local authority level within the North East. While the recovery of the retail, wholesale and accommodation sectors was relatively uniform across North East local authorities, subsectors and locations in manufacturing saw different trends. In particular the automotive industry in Sunderland faced further significant disruption in 2021 due to semiconductor shortages, which explains why the total GVA contributed by this sector in Sunderland continued to fall in 2021. 
 

Further information

For breakdowns by sector, GVA is used rather than GDP. The latter is equivalent to:
GVA plus VAT plus other taxes on products less subsidies on products.

The evidence hub also includes LEP and local authority area GDP estimates and experimental quarterly GDP estimates at a regional level (where the North East region includes the North East and Tees Valley LEP areas). In addition, the hub includes GVA per hour, a key measure of labour productivity.