UK Civil Society Almanac volunteering statistics

NCVO has published its UK Civil Society Almanac 2013, which includes statistics on how many people regularly volunteer, who volunteers and what volunteer work they do.

During August 2012 to January 2013, 44% of adults in England said that they had formally volunteered at least once in the previous 12 months and 29% of people reported that they formally volunteered at least once a month.

This equates to 19.1million people in England formally volunteering at least once a year and 12.6million people in England formally volunteering once a month. If the survey results were equally valid for the UK adult population as a whole, these estimates would increase to 22.7million volunteering once a year and 15.1million volunteering once a month.

The Volunteers supported a variety of different types of organisations in a range of fields. The most popular fields for regular volunteers who formally volunteer at least once a month are sports and exercise (54%); hobbies, recreation, arts and social clubs (42%); and religion (36%). By far the most common activities undertaken by regular formal volunteers are organising or helping to run an activity or event (52%) and raising or handling money/taking part in sponsored events (51%).

The proportion of people formally volunteering at least once a month in the last 12 months prior to being interviewed is significantly higher than in 2010/11 (29% compared to 25%) and in all years from 2007-08. The proportion of people who formally volunteered at least once a year over the same period has also significantly increased from 39% in 2010/11 to 44% in August 2012-January 2013, and is higher than in the last three years.

Participation in formal volunteering differs by employment status, age, ethnicity, disability and region. People in employment are more likely to volunteer than those who are economically inactive (48% and 40% respectively, with a rate of 34% for people who are unemployed).

Those living in the South West (52%), South East (51%) and East of England (47%) are more likely to volunteer than those living in the North East (35%), North West (36%) and London (40%).

Half (50%) of people aged 35 to 49 formally volunteer at least once a year compared to one-third (41%) of those aged 26 to 34. Women were more likely than men to volunteer, with 46% of women volunteering compared to 42% of men.

The statistics on volunteering in the Almanac were based on the results of the Cabinet Office Community Life survey.

For further information visit http://data.ncvo-vol.org.uk/a/almanac13/volunteering/who-volunteers-in-the-uk-2 and http://communitylife.cabinetoffice.gov.uk.