Charities struggling to find volunteers amid financial crisis

Charities say they are struggling to find volunteers as people prioritise paid employment in the current financial crisis.

A report by Volunteering New Zealand, which surveyed 420 organisations and 1500 volunteers, also noted a move towards casual volunteering of just a few hours a week.

The State of Volunteering in Aotearoa New Zealand 2024 report also found a quarter of volunteers performed up to five hours a month, while only seven percent did 20 hours or more.

Volunteering New Zealand chief executive Michelle Kitney said organisations were reporting a lack of volunteers as a concern, but an even bigger issue was not having enough time or resources to support their volunteers.

"That's in the context of wider funding security issues and concerns in relation to future funding for their volunteer programmes."

The survey was conducted in February, before swingeing budget cuts and job losses in the public sector and elsewhere.

Kitney said that, "on the flip side", it was still great to see more people chipping in.

"We really want to celebrate that. The benefits of volunteering [are] huge."

Kitney said urban centres had the highest proportion of new volunteers, of less than a year, but they also had a higher turnover rates than in the regions, where some volunteers had been helping the same organisation for as long as 15 years.