Nine Indicators Updated in December 2024

Five of these are from the Scottish Household Survey 2023 which was published in December. These are:

• 53% of people feel satisfied with public services, a 1% decrease from 2022. Shetland had the joint sixth highest level of satisfaction with public services in Scotland, alongside East Renfrewshire. The Scottish average was 43%.
• 82% of people engaged in physical activity, a 5% decrease from the previous year. The Scottish average was 79%. 
• 24% of people feel they can influence decisions affecting their local area, a 6% decrease from 2022. However, alongside Stirling and Fife, Shetland had the joint second highest percentage of people who felt they could influence decisions affecting their local area in Scotland. The Scottish average was 18%.
• 91% of people feel part of their community, a 1% increase on the previous year. 82% of people in Scotland felt part of their community. 
• 30% of people feel they want to be more involved in decision making, a decrease from 37% the previous year. The Scottish average was also 30%. 

The Scottish Health Survey 2023 published in November 2024 showed that 19% of people in Shetland were drinking at harmful levels. This is the same level as between 2018-2022 and lower than the Scottish rate of 20%. However, this means that almost a fifth of people in Shetland drink above the Chief Medical Officer’s low-risk guidelines. 

Public Health Scotland released the Primary 1 Body Mass Index (BMI) statistics Scotland School year 2023 to 2024, in December 2024. 17.9% of children in Primary 1 in Shetland were not a healthy weight, an increase on the previous year’s 13%. In Scotland, 15.7% of children in Primary 1 in Scotland were not a healthy weight, an increase of 0.7%.

National Records of Scotland’s Mid-2023 Population Estimates show that 14% of the population in Shetland were aged 16-29 in 2023, the same level as 2022. 16.9% of the Scottish population were aged between 16-29 in both 2022 and 2023. 

The Office for National Statistics’ Business Register and Employment Survey 2023 was updated in November. It showed there were 13,600 employees in Shetland, an increase on the previous year. 

For updated data, trends, analysis and our other indicators, take a look at our data pages.