The culture industries are a separate and autonomous pillar of cultural life in the Federal Republic of Germany.
Generally, the cultural field is divided into three sectors: a) private cultural enterprises, b) state or municipal publicly financed institutions and c) not-for-profit, intermediary organisations, foundations, associations etc. According to the Conference of Minister of Economic Affairs and Energy in 2009 the cultural and creative industry consists of 11 submarkets: music industry, book market, art market, film industry, broadcasting industry, performing arts market, architecture market, design industry, press market, advertising market and software and games industry (and others).
Once a year, the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy (since 2009) publishes the status and perspectives of the cultural and creative industries in Germany in the monitoring report “Cultural and Creative Industries”.
According to the current monitoring report “Cultural and Creative Industries 2020“, approx. 259 600 companies were active in 2019 (compared to 2018: + approx. 3 000). These companies generated a turnover of 174.1 billion euros compared to 2018: +3.0 billion). The submarkets, design, software/games and architecture had the highest number of companies (23%, 16% and 15%), while the submarkets with the highest turnover were software/games, press and advertising (29%, 17% and 17%). Gross value added in the culture and creative industries was EUR 106.4 billion in 2019. It thus contributes 3.1 percent to the total economic output.
In Germany, 1.84 million people were employed in the culture and creative industries (comparison 2018: 1.7 million). They are made up of core employees, whose share is 67 percent, and marginally employed persons, whose share is 33 percent. Both groups are subdivided into the employed and the self-employed. The 1.24 million core employees are made up of 0.98 million employees subject to social insurance contributions and 0.256 million self-employed and freelancers with an annual turnover of more than 17 500 euros. The marginally employed consist of 0.3 million mini-self-employed (under 17 500 euros annual turnover) and marginally employed. In 2019, the culture and creative industries contributed 106.4 billion euros (2018: 100.5 billion euros) and thus 3.1 per cent to the total gross value added.
According to the latest monitoring report, the total turnover of the culture and creative industries has increased by around 40 billion euros over the last ten years, from 134.3 billion euros (2009) to a total of 174.1 billion euros (2019). This corresponds to an average annual growth rate of 2.6 percent. This positive trend will not continue due to Corona; for 2020, significant sales losses of between 13 and 24 percent are expected, depending on the scenario. The individual submarkets are affected to varying degrees.
On 20.1.2022, a so-called “Betroffenheitspapier”: “Betroffenheit der Kultur- und Kreativwirtschaft von der Corona-Pandemie. Economic impacts 2020, 2021 &2022 based on a scenario analysis” was presented. According to this, the turnover losses for the cultural and creative industries for 2020 were -15.3 billion euros. The submarkets particularly affected include the performing arts market (-81 %), the music industry (-44 %), the film industry (-41 %) and the art market (-39 %):In the meantime, reports on cultural industries are available in all federal states and are updated at different intervals. The most recent versions are listed here:
- Baden-Württemberg 2021 (6th Report of the State Government on the Cultural and Creative Industries)
- Bavaria 2020 (Second Bavarian Culture and Creative Industries Report)
- Berlin/Brandenburg2015(2 .Kultur -und Kreativwirtschaftsindex)
- Bremen 2010
- Hamburg 2019 (Data report on the culture and creative industries in the Hamburg metropolitan region)
- Hessen 2021 (6th Culture and Creative Industries Report)
- Mecklenburg-Vorpommern 2016 (Kultur- und Kreativwirtschaft Mecklenburg-Vorpommern)
- Lower Saxony 2019 (Monitoring Cultural and Creative Industries in Lower Saxony 2014-2018)
- North Rhine-Westphalia 2019 (Creativ. Report)
- Rhineland-Palatinate 2021 (Rhineland-Palatinate location study)
- Saarland 2011 (Creative Industries Report Saarland)
- Saxony 2019 (2nd Culture and Creative Industries Report: for Saxony)
- Saxony-Anhalt 2020 (Market Report: Cultural and Creative Industries in Saxony-Anhalt)
- Schleswig-Holstein 2017 (Daten zur Kultur- und Kreativwwwirtschaft Schleswig-Holstein) and
- Thüringen 2011(Kreativwirtschaft in Thüringen).
Numerous municipalities have also published cultural industry reports – e.g. Dortmund, Düsseldorf, Aachen, Dresden, Cologne and Karlsruhe.
Increasingly, strategic partnerships between the public and private sectors are also being formed in the Federal Republic of Germany for cultural projects and institutions (public-private partnerships). For the future, it is to be expected that these strategic partnerships will expand even further. Overall, the cultural industries have been a growth factor in recent years. Due to the Corona crisis, this trend will not continue. In addition, for about 20 years there have been increasing efforts on the part of cultural policy to promote the private cultural industry not only through tax breaks and comparable benefits, but also directly, for example by supporting a music export office (since 2003).
In 2007, there were intense discussions about the relevance of the cultural and creative industries for the economic development and employment situation in Germany. The Federal Government, in particular the Ministry of Economics and the Commissioner for Culture and the Media, introduced the programme “Initiative Culture and Creative Industries” as a method to improve the framework conditions for their growth and to support financially and infrastructurally the “Music Initiative”, a core area of the creative industries. This topic represented an important place in the German EU Presidency in the first half of 2007.
The report of the Enquete Commission of the German Bundestag 2007 also devoted a separate chapter to the cultural and creative industries. The “Jahrbuch für Kulturpolitik 2008” of the Institute for Cultural Policy of the Kulturpolitische Gesellschaft was also dedicated to this topic.
Training and further education programmes for the cultural industries are offered both at universities and colleges, where a number of degree programmes in the field of cultural management have been created in recent years. In the federal states, there are various programmes for counselling and further education for start-ups, some of which also focus on the arts and cultural sector. One of the pioneers was the programme “Creae.NRW”, which was launched by the NRW Ministry of Economic Affairs in 2007.
In 2010, the “Cultural and Creative Industries Initiative” took another important step by establishing a competence centre for cultural and creative industries in Eschborn with eight regional offices. After the completion of the first project period 2010-2015, the competence centre was restructured for the second project period 2016 to 2019 (a central office + a new sponsor: the u-institut) and the task portfolio was modified (incl. strengthening the visibility of the cultural and creative industries). In the third project period since 2020, the sponsorship is in the hands of the u-institute and Prognos.
The task of the Competence Centre is to contribute to anchoring the importance of the cultural and creative industries as an independent sector and information engine more visibly in the economy, society and culture “56. The implementation takes place through “intra- and intersectoral networking, cross- border cooperation and extraordinary event formats. It is a nationwide contact point for the cultural and creative industries, a think tank and network actor” (https://www.kultur-kreativ- wirtschaft.de/KUK/Navigation/DE/Kompetenzzentrum/kompetenzzentrum.html) .
In summer 2021, the Coalition Culture and Creative Industries Germany (k3d) was founded (https://k3- d.org/) as an open alliance of leading private-sector interest groups. It unites representatives of the audiovisual, book, design, gallery, press, fashion, music and cultural event industries and sees itself as a mouthpiece for social and economic change and develops statements and demands on cultural, media and socio-political issues. Its central demands include the creation of an exposed responsibility for the cultural and creative industries at the federal level and ensuring coordination at the Länder and EU levels.
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