Ecclesiastical Insurance and its parent company Benefact Group have launched a new resource for charity brokers to assess the previously unstudied socio-economic value of volunteering and donating.
Called the Value of Giving 2022 Report, the study was commissioned by Benefact Group and conducted by the Centre of Economics and Business Research (Cebr). This new research revealed several key findings, including a £23 billion total figure for donations in 2022. This number represents 0.8% of the total UK GDP and is larger than the sports and gambling sector combined (£18.4 billion).
The report also found that the estimated annual value of voluntary work to the economy was £18.7 billion, not including the additional charitable donations worth £4.3 billion.
In the decade before the pandemic, volunteering saw a steady increase, rising from £11.2 billion to £18.7 billion in the period between 2010/11 to 2018/19. The global pandemic caused it to fall rapidly to £11 billion in 2020, but it has since recovered, reaching £18.7 billion once again in 2022.
The factor behind the post-pandemic surge comes down to a larger proportion of adults giving up their free time to help good causes, with percentages rising from 17.9% in 2018/19 to 29.7% in 2022. That said, while there are a lot more people doing charity work, they are also spending less time doing it. Volunteering hours have halved since 2020, from 12 hours spent over a four-week period to six hours in the same timeframe in 2022.
Charitable donations rose steadily from £5.9 billion in 2010/11 to £9.8 billion in 2020 but have since fallen to £4.3 billion in 2022. The report surmised that the steep drop is likely due to increased cost of living in the UK, which translates to less giving overall.
Despite the drop in both average cash value of donations and the amount of time spent volunteering, the research found that there are more people giving and volunteering overall, higher than even during the pre-pandemic period. Three in four UK adults (76%) donated to charity in 2022, up from 64% in 2018/19.
Ecclesiastical Insurance managing director Mark Hews said that this landmark piece of research is testament to the charity sector being a cornerstone of British society.
“As the third-largest corporate donor in the UK, charitable giving is at the heart of what we do and we donate all our available profits to good causes. We encourage businesses – who can also play a pivotal role in supporting the sector – to continue to donate and empower their employees to continue volunteering. The combined effort of corporates collectively donating a proportion of their profits and the public kindly giving up time to volunteer can drive a crucial movement for good within society,” Hews said.
Another study from the insurer revealed that brokers in the country lack interest in net zero initiatives.
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