Annual report comparison research

Annual report comparison research

New report ?sheds light on impact of Covid-19 on the charity sector

Between 2019 and 2021 the charity sector was to the fore in experiencing the impact of Covid-19. Our recently published analysis of annual reports submitted to the Charities Regulator across these three years showed the resilience of the sector as well as the financial impact of the pandemic. [Read more]

While it is likely to be another couple of years before the full effect of the pandemic on individual charities, and the wider sector can be determined, the research provides a snap shot of the years from 2019 and 2021. Our research indicates that charities may have fared better than other non-profits during the pandemic, when compared to research carried out into the non-profit sector for the Giving Ireland Report 2022. Our analysis of a sample set of the annual reports of 3,170 charities, representing 41% of all non-school charities, also indicates that while there was an overall increase in income in the sector, this was likely due to the extra supports that were made available to charities by the Government.

It is noted that almost one third of all charities in the sample did not receive any government funding. Income for charities who were not in receipt of government or public funding dropped by over 44% from an average income of €852,000 in 2019, to an average of €473,000 in 2021.

Not surprisingly, there was a dramatic drop in donations from fundraising events between 2019 and 2021, which saw a 21% reduction as a source of income. There was also a significant drop in the amount raised from traditional cash collections between 2019 and 2020.

This drop in income was seen against an 8% rise in overall expenditure from 2019 to 2021. This included a 4.2% rise in staffing costs. Even with these increases, for the charities examined in the sample, income exceeded expenditure in each of the three years.

Of the 3,170 charities in the sample, 34% were volunteer only, with 51% of those having fewer than nine volunteers. While the latest analysis does not address changes in volunteer numbers, previous research does show that 33% of charities saw a reduction in the number of volunteers.?This research carried out early in the pandemic, in May 2020, on behalf of the Charities Regulator also showed that 60% of charities saw no change in the number of volunteers, with 6% even seeing an increase.

Read the report: Ireland’s Registered Charities 2019 – 2021: An analysis of the annual reports submitted by registered charities to the Charities Regulator over three consecutive years, in full on our website.?