Spain

Fundación la Caixa – Social Observatory

The Social Observatory is a social research and knowledge observatory within the Fundación la Caixa Philanthropy. The foundation was established in 1904 and has its headquarters in Barcelona, Spain.

Key topics of the Observatory are transformation, impact, listening and collaboration, flexibility, and optimisation.

(Research) questions guiding their work are, among others:

Introduction to Philanthropy Research in Spain

By Helena Monill Badell, Lisa Hehenberger, Guido Lanese Pettit and Dalia Silberstein

Research on philanthropy in Spain remains relatively limited and fragmented. Much of the available research focuses on foundations, while studies of individual donors tend to concentrate on their sociological characteristics rather than the overall scale and impact of their giving. Philanthropy research is also frequently embedded within broader studies of the Third Sector of Social Action or specialised work on family and corporate foundations.

A central challenge is the absence of a single institution or platform responsible for collecting and disseminating comprehensive philanthropic data. This is particularly problematic for household giving and corporate philanthropy, where available figures are spread across different studies and sources.

The Asociación Española de Fundaciones (AEF) is one of the most important institutional actors in the Spanish philanthropic ecosystem. Through its Institute for Strategic Analysis of Foundations (INAEF), it produces research on the structure, economic contribution and social impact of Spain’s foundation sector. Important publications include studies of the economic and social contribution of foundations, their development between 2008 and 2019, post-COVID strategies, and personal and family philanthropic foundations.

The Spanish Fundraising Association (AEFr) contributes research on individual and major donors, recurring giving and nonprofit fundraising. Other important sources include IE University, CaixaBank, the Spanish Tax Agency, the Ministry of Culture, the Third Sector Platform and academic research centres such as ESADE’s Center for Social Impact.

Overview of Giving in Spain

Giving by individuals

Individual philanthropy in Spain has grown in terms of participation. According to the Donor Profile 2022, approximately 15.9 million Spaniards, equivalent to 39% of the population, donated to nonprofit organisations in 2022. This was around one million more donors than in 2020.

Regular contributions made monthly, quarterly or twice yearly were reported by 22% of donors. The causes of greatest concern included children, mentioned by 53% of respondents, older people by 49%, people with health problems by 45%, people with disabilities by 41%, and people experiencing poverty by 37%. Environmental causes were mentioned by 35%.

The most frequently reported barrier to giving was lack of financial resources, cited by 39% of non-donors, followed closely by distrust of nonprofit organisations at 36%.

Research among 15 of Spain’s largest fundraising NGOs provides more detailed information on recurring donors. Together, these organisations had approximately four million members contributing €599 million annually and 2.68 million additional donors contributing around €89 million in voluntary income. In 2022, the average annual contribution per donor was €148.98, compared with €144.64 in 2020.

Donors tend to be older and disproportionately female. Around 60% were women, 61% of members were over 55, and Madrid and Barcelona together accounted for 31.7% of members.

The distribution of donations is highly skewed toward relatively small contributions. The Barometer of Private Philanthropy in Spain found that 97.8% of donors gave less than €500 annually. Around 2.14% donated between €500 and €3,000, while only 0.03% gave more than €5,000 per year.

Tax data provide another perspective. In 2022, individuals claimed approximately €690 million in donations to organisations covered by Law 49/2002 and another €1.45 million in donations to foundations and public-benefit associations outside that regime. These data only capture tax-declared giving and therefore underestimate the full scale of philanthropy.

The best overall estimate presented for 2022 places total household giving at approximately €2.36 billion. Around 15.9 million people, or 39% of Spaniards, donated during the year, while the average annual contribution among regular donors was approximately €149.

No recent national data allow this €2.36 billion to be reliably divided among individual causes.

Bequest giving

No comprehensive national estimate of charitable bequests is available for Spain in the source data. Bequests are therefore recorded separately as not available in the national overview.

Some studies of personal and family foundations include bequests among possible sources of foundation income, but they do not provide a national estimate of charitable legacy giving by individuals.

Corporate giving

Corporate philanthropy in Spain takes several forms, including direct donations, corporate foundations and employee volunteering. Companies may donate directly to nonprofit organisations aligned with their social or impact objectives, while some also encourage employees to support particular causes.

Tax data provide one partial measure. In 2019, 18,337 corporate entities claimed deductions for donations under Law 49/2002. The total amount deducted was approximately €200.26 million, corresponding to an average of €10,921 per entity. Higher-income companies were both more likely to donate and tended to claim larger deductions.

Corporate volunteering is also widespread. An estimated 67% of Spanish companies participate in corporate-volunteering activities. Increasingly, employees contribute professional expertise as well as time, helping nonprofits with areas such as organisational processes, infrastructure and capacity building.

Corporate foundations are an especially important component of Spanish philanthropy. Approximately 730 corporate foundations had been identified, although this is considered a conservative estimate. Banking foundations account for a particularly large share of the resources held by corporate foundations.

For 2018, corporate foundations were estimated to have contributed at least €1.2 billion. This figure is used as the best available estimate in the national source table, although it should not be interpreted as a comprehensive estimate of all corporate giving in 2022.

Large corporate and banking foundations play a prominent role in areas including financial inclusion, education, health and international development. Between 2016 and 2019, Spanish private organisations contributed an estimated €3.9 billion to international development, although a substantial share came from a small number of major institutions.

Foundations

Foundations are central to Spain’s philanthropic infrastructure, but the sector remains difficult to measure comprehensively because financial reporting varies substantially across Spain’s autonomous communities and their respective supervisory authorities.

Available economic data cover 5,204 foundations, representing approximately 49.5% of active foundations. In 2020, these organisations reported total revenues of €11.79 billion and expenditures of approximately €11.81 billion. Their economic activity generated gross value added equivalent to around 1.6% of Spanish GDP.

The wider foundation population is significantly larger. Spain had 15,821 registered foundations in 2020, of which approximately 10,511 were estimated to be active.

Private sources dominate foundation funding. Across the 2008–2019 period, approximately 84% of foundation income came from private sources and 16% from public funding. In 2019, donations and grants accounted for approximately 59.2% of foundation income, while the provision of services and sale of goods generated around 34.7% and income from assets around 6.2%.

Personal and family philanthropic foundations form a distinct part of the sector. Research among 269 such foundations found strong concentration of resources: only eight foundations accounted for 53% of annual revenue, while 125 smaller organisations generated just 9%. More than half had endowments below €500,000.

A comprehensive figure for foundation grantmaking is unavailable. To approximate giving financed from endowments, the publication applies the average 2008–2019 share of foundation income derived from assets — 9.24% — to the €11.79 billion in foundation revenue reported for 2020. This produces an estimated €1.09 billion in endowment-derived foundation giving.

This €1.09 billion estimate should therefore be understood as an approximation rather than a directly observed national figure.

Charity lotteries

Spain has several major lottery systems with strong links to social and charitable purposes, including the state lottery operator SELAE, ONCE and fundraising lotteries associated with organisations such as the Spanish Red Cross.

SELAE generated approximately €9.687 billion in lottery revenues in 2022. ONCE generated €2.426 billion from its socially oriented lottery products. The Spanish Red Cross raised approximately €34 million through its independently managed Sorteo del Oro.

These figures represent lottery revenues or fundraising proceeds rather than the amount ultimately donated to charitable purposes. Because the available sources do not provide a comparable figure for actual charitable distributions, no national estimate of giving through charity lotteries is included.

Sources of Contributions in Spain

The publication combines the best available figures into an indicative total of approximately €4.65 billion. Individual giving represents €2.36 billion, corporate foundations approximately €1.2 billion and endowment-derived foundation giving approximately €1.09 billion. These figures relate to different reference years and data sources and should therefore not be interpreted as a precise estimate of total giving in Spain in 2022.

Individual giving is the most recent of the three monetary estimates. Approximately 15.9 million Spaniards donated in 2022, producing an estimated €2.36 billion in household giving.

Foundation data remain particularly important but incomplete. In 2020, 5,204 foundations reported more than €11 billion in revenue, yet these organisations represented only around half of active Spanish foundations. Applying the historical average share of income derived from assets produces the €1.09 billion estimate used for endowment-based foundation giving.

Across all areas of Spanish philanthropy, the principal research challenge remains data fragmentation. Differences in terminology, classification and regional reporting make it difficult to construct a unified national picture. More standardised definitions, stronger reporting systems and improved transparency would substantially strengthen the evidence base for Spanish philanthropy.

Source

Monill Badell, H., Hehenberger, L., Lanese Pettit, G., & Silberstein, D. (2026). Philanthropy in Spain. In B. Hoolwerf & J. Vamstad (Eds.), Philanthropy in Europe: Mapping Research and Data on Donations by Households, Bequests, Foundations, Corporations and Charity Lotteries (pp. 291–316). European Research Network on Philanthropy.

You can download the full publication here: Philanthropy in Europe.