Publication - Statistics

GDP Quarterly National Accounts: 2022 Quarter 4 (October to December)

Published: 26 April 2023
Directorate: Chief Economist Directorate
Topic: Economy

This publication includes updated estimates of onshore GDP growth in real terms up to the fourth quarter of 2022, along with additional breakdowns of GDP by categories of income and expenditure, and key household sector economic statistics, which are used for economic forecasting and modelling.

Key results

In 2022 Quarter 4, Scotland’s onshore GDP is estimated to have grown by 0.2% compared to the previous quarter, revised up from the first estimate of 0.1% published on 1 March. This follows a downwardly revised fall of 0.3% in 2022 Quarter 3 and unrevised 0.0% growth in Quarter 2.
In 2022, annual GDP grew by 4.9% compared to 2021, after growing by 8.4% in 2021 and falling by 12.2% in 2020 during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic.
In the latest quarter there was growth of 0.2% overall in the services sector, growth of 0.1% in the production sector, and growth of 1.0% in the construction sector.
The household saving ratio was 7.8% in the latest quarter, up from 7.6% at the same point last year, and similar to pre-pandemic levels. Over the last year there has been a 9.2% increase in consumer expenditure, driven by high price inflation, which has outpaced growth in households’ disposable income of 6.0%. This indicates a fall in non-pension savings, however the overall savings ratio has been boosted by very high levels of the adjustment for the change in pension entitlements, because of high gilt yields in the second half of 2022.

Information About This Release

The coronavirus pandemic led to a number of challenges in collecting and processing the data to calculate GDP. As a result, estimates for 2020 and 2021, in particular, are subject to more uncertainty than usual and may be more prone to revision over time. International comparisons, and comparisons within the UK, should be made with appropriate caution for the levels of uncertainty and variations in methods in use by different statistical institutes around the world.

Correction

27/4/2023: Data in the volume GDP table 1.3, rows 129 to 131, was found to be missing. This has now been corrected. We apologise for any inconvenience caused by this error.