International Grants Rose by 8% Last Year

Foundation giving to international causes rose to $3.8-billion last year, the largest amount American grant makers

have ever awarded overseas, says a new report.

Such giving grew by $300-million from 2004, an 8-percent increase, not adjusting for inflation, according to the report by the Foundation Center, in New York.

The Foundation Center estimated the 2005 international giving by all 68,000 grant-making foundations in America based on giving data for the largest 1,172 funds. While the report includes the 2005 figure, it mainly focuses on 2004, the most recent year for which in-depth data are available.

The Foundation Center says that giving abroad has grown steadily during the last few years. Such giving has more than doubled since 1998, when international grants equaled $1.6-billion. But the substantial growth in the amount of money going abroad is largely attributed to the emergence of two wealthy funds, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which focuses on global health, and the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, which finances international conservation. In 2004, these two philanthropies accounted for $1.3-billion of the $3.5-billion that went abroad.

Among other findings:

• More money flowed to American charities that work internationally than to nonprofit groups outside the United States. In 2004, the largest philanthropies gave $2-billion to American organizations, while their overseas counterparts received $821.6-million, a 3-percent decline compared with 2002. The report says that the federal government’s attempt to block charitable assets from supporting terrorism in the Middle East and elsewhere have led foundations to be more wary about making grants to charities that are based outside the United States.

• Excluding Western Europe, charities in sub-Saharan Africa received the largest percentage of international grants, 19 percent. Groups in Europe received 32 percent, but most of that money was used to support charitable efforts in Africa and other impoverished regions. Almost 50 percent of the money donated in 2004 focused on improving global health.

• Of all philanthropies, community foundations increased their international giving by the largest percentage. Such grants rose 35 percent, to $39.2-million, from 2002 to 2004.

The Foundation Center predicted that international grants will continue to rise, fueled primarily by the investor Warren Buffett’s roughly $30-billion pledge to the Gates Foundation. But the center warned that “continued volatility in the stock market, the anticipated economic slowdown, renewed fears of inflation, and the heightened uncertainty brought about by record oil prices and increasing strife in the Middle East may undermine” this growth.

The report, “International Grant Making Update,” is available free on the Foundation Center’s Web site.

INTERNATIONAL GIVING BY AMERICAN FOUNDATIONS Percentage of Grant Dollars That Support Programs Abroad 1986 8.1% 1990 11.5% 1994 11.5% 1998 10.9% 2002 13.8% 2004 18.0% NOTE: 2004 figures are based on a survey of 1,172 foundations. Where Charities That Receive Grants Are Based, 2004 Western Europe 32.0% Sub-Saharan Africa 19.3% Asia and the Pacific 18.1% Latin America 11.0% Eastern Europe, Russia, and Independent States 7.5% North Africa and the Middle East 6.6% Canada 4.9% Caribbean 0.6% Total $821.6-million Causes That Attract Support Health 49.1% International development and relief 11.1% Environment 6.4% International affairs 6.0% Education 5.5% Public affairs and society benefit 5.3% Human rights 4.2% Social sciences 4.2% Arts and culture 4.1% Science 2.2% Religion 2.0% Total $2.8-billion SOURCE: Foundation Center