Only photographers will want to shoot the messenger when CFTPA president and CEO Guy Mayson delivers Profile 2008 to the crowd at Prime Time in Ottawa on Feb. 21. Overall production volume in Canada increased by 3% — to just under $5 billion — during the period from March 2006 to April 2007.

‘After a shaky few years we seem to be back into a growth curve,’ Mayson tells Playback, regarding the results in the CFTPA’s annual report, which reflects both domestic and service productions.

Mayson notes these positive results rank in the top three years ever (after 2002/03 and ’03/04).

Domestic television was the savior. Both independent and broadcaster in-house production (primarily sports and news) had a record year, with increases of 17% to $2.1 billion and 11% to $1.1 billion, respectively.

Meanwhile, domestic feature film plunged 14% to $282 million and service production dropped a precipitous 19% — to $1.4 billion from $1.7 billion — its lowest total since 1998/99. Mayson points to fluctuating currencies, labor unrest and competitive U.S. tax incentives as the culprits.

‘The ACTRA strike, the rising [Canadian] dollar and increased competition in other territories created a lot of uncertainty at an unfortunate time,’ says Mayson, noting that Ontario and B.C. were the worst hit.

Mayson says one of the major boosters for domestic television was various specialty channels making good on federal expenditure requirements.

‘The great thing about specialty is they are working with expenditure requirements for Canadian programming as part of their licence requirement, and they take it pretty seriously,’ Mayson explains. ‘As their revenues increase, their expenditure in Canadian production increases. We like that equation.’

Breaking it down by sector, there was a surge last year in children’s television — primarily animation — which soared 25% to $354 million. Docs were also up approximately 17%, to $436 million. TV drama, meanwhile, climbed 5% to $904 million.

‘There’s a market force there,’ says Mayson. ‘We’re not back to the numbers we were at a few years ago, but it’s a nice sign of Canadian movement.’

There also appears to be an industry-wide shift taking place over time, with a return to the makeup of the late 1990s, whereby domestic TV accounts for a larger share of overall production — a combined 72% — while the U.S. contribution on the whole is on the way down.

‘Foreign location is always going to be an important part of our business,’ says Mayson, ‘but it’s not the record highs of three or four years ago.’

The picture for location work is likely to have become even grimmer since the end of the Profile 2008 reporting period, April 2007. Since that time, the Canadian dollar has spiked, and the Writers Guild of America strike has grown roots.

‘Basically things are shut down,’ Mayson says. ‘The only thing going is feature films, because the scripts are already done.’ Even then, he notes, productions are treading lightly so as not to ruffle feathers on the labor front.