Philea releases latest data on the institutional philanthropy landscape in Europe
Brussels, Belgium 30 April 2025 – Today, Philea released the latest iteration of it’s public-benefits foundations in Europe report. The new data was collected primarily from national associations of donors and experts in the sector and covers 34 European countries, including 23 EU Member States.
“While data alone does not capture the full essence of our sector, it offers a crucial foundation for understanding the scale and diversity of institutional philanthropy in Europe. It helps to provide a more comprehensive picture and context for our sector, enabling more informed decisions and stronger collaboration,” stated Delphine Moralis, CEO of Philea
The Fabric of Giving 2025, expanded on the 2023 dataset, increasing country coverage from 26 to 34, and is based on a more rigorous and consistent data collection methodology. As in previous editions, both quantitative and qualitative data were gathered to supplement the numerical data, but this time in great detail.
The 2025 data identifies 175,203 public-benefit foundations with combined assets of €516bn* and a total annual expenditure of €76bn.
The 23 EU Member States included in this study are Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Spain and Sweden. The 11 non-EU countries included in the dataset are Albania, Andorra, Georgia, Liechtenstein, North Macedonia, Norway, Serbia, Switzerland, Türkiye, Ukraine and the United Kingdom.
While this is the most comprehensive study of its kind to date, several limitations remain, which are detailed in the full publication. These include differing definitions for foundations, challenges with disaggregated data, lack of continuity in some data and an absence of financial data in countries where foundations are not required to publish annual accounts/reports.
Philea is deeply grateful for the support of the experts and philanthropy infrastructure organisations that contributed to this effort.
Download the full report here.
Notes to the editor:
Data was collected specifically on public-benefit foundations, meaning it meets the following five criteria:
- They are independent, separately-constituted non-profit bodies.
- They have no members or shareholders.
- They have their own established and reliable source of income, usually but not exclusively from an endowment.
- They have their own governing board.
- They distribute their financial resources for educational, cultural, religious, social or other public benefit purposes, either by:
- Supporting associations, charities and educational institutions or individuals.
- Operating their own programmes.
Therefore, where possible, participants were requested to exclude the following foundation types from the data:
- Private-benefit foundations (foundations which pursue private purposes such as “the advancement of one family, relatives of the founder, trust funds for the education of the founder’s children, etc.”).
- Foundations established and largely operated by the state (because such foundations are not privately governed and do not operate independently from the state).
- Inactive foundations (foundations which are no longer active but have not been removed from public records).
- Other types of public-benefit organisations.
*Updated from €519bn on 8 May.
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