AYV News, September 8, 2023

Sierra Leone is ranked 7th on the World Giving Index 2022, ahead of Canada and all of Europe – by the UK based Charities Aid Foundation (CAF).

The index uses ‘helping strangers’, ‘donating money to charity’ and ‘hours spent volunteering’ to rank the levels of generosity of countries around the world.

CAF has been producing its World Giving Index for more than a decade. The first CAF World Giving Index was published in the wake of the global financial crisis, and now this long-running study has given us the opportunity to look at how the Covid-19 pandemic and its aftermath have impacted giving around the world.

The study provides combined insight into the scope and nature of giving around the world and looks at three aspects of giving behaviour and asks: Have you done any of the following in the past month?

• Helped a stranger, or someone you didn’t know who needed help?
• Donated money to a charity?
• Volunteered your time to an organisation?

The extraordinary events of past year have reinforced the importance of civil society and international collaboration. The CAF World Giving Index offers a unique glimpse of global trends in generosity:

• The most generous country in the world is Indonesiafor the fifth year in a row
• The Top 10 most generous countries have changed substantially in 2021
• More than three billion people helped someone they didn’t know in 2021
• More people than ever donated money in 2021

CAF Chief Executive, Neil Heslop said: “This year’s report showed major developments in giving practices around the world. More people donated money to charity in 2021 than in any year of the previous decade, despite a global pandemic and the economic hardship experienced by many communities globally.

“The increase in the proportion of people who helped a stranger was striking, as was the surge of generosity in several Central and South American countries and African countries.

“How people give changed during the pandemic and continues to evolve in unprecedented ways. Here at CAF, we take pride in charting these crucial developments and monitoring how trends in giving practices are shifting as countries worldwide pursue social progress, frequently in line with the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.”