In normal times, a billion people volunteer their time and energy each year, providing unpaid help to others, according to the ILO. Has the COVID-19 pandemic led to even more volunteering worldwide?
The ILO noted that despite the lack of more recent global estimates, some easily accessible data suggest that interest in volunteering as such increased around the world during March and April 2020.
“Looking at the past five years, the highest values of the Google search index for the word “volunteering” – in different languages – were registered precisely in those two months in early 2020 when the pandemic was at its height”, the ILO said.
But did the level of actual participation in volunteering follow the same pattern?
“It is difficult to say”, the ILO admitted.
The ILO explained that the difficulty lies in the fact that some people may have searched for information about volunteering without themselves intending to volunteer. Many of those who searched for volunteering opportunities may not have been able to carry out the activities they wanted to because of COVID‑19 restrictions or illness. Besides, many people most likely volunteered without looking first on Google.
The ILO further stated that regardless of what the actual number of volunteers has been during the pandemic, an important conclusion that can be drawn is that people from different parts of the world and the most diverse cultures reacted similarly to the crisis.
Although Google search index values can only serve as an approximation of the level of interest in volunteering, they do show that such interest increased significantly at a time when societies needed cohesion and solidarity as never before. This is an encouraging finding and should be taken into account when designing and implementing policies to achieve fair and sustainable development.
The ILO noted that through organizations or individually, many people have volunteered to help those who needed support. Indeed, most people on the planet have probably done so, given the scale of the crisis. Very likely, you have helped a friend or a neighbor at least once in these challenging times.
There are unfortunately no global estimates of the number of people who performed volunteer work this year. Only a few countries regularly measure volunteer work, and some of those that do had to suspend their data collection because of COVID-19 restrictions. The last global estimate was published in 2018. According to this estimate by the United Nations Volunteer (UNV) program, one billion people choose to provide unpaid help to others, their combined efforts being the equivalent of 109 million full-time workers annually.
Estimating the volunteering potential
A wide range of metrics currently used to gauge the rate of progress in different areas at the national, regional, and international levels – such as the indicators for the Sustainable Development Goals – could be applied to estimate the need for volunteer work.
However, the ILO indicated that precise data for indicators of the actual and potential supply of volunteer work are generally not available, because only a small number of countries measure volunteering regularly. Moreover, it is difficult to make international comparisons because of the different measurement approaches used.
To tackle this problem, the ILO and the UNV program have developed new survey tools and data collection guidance. Countries are encouraged to apply these to produce comprehensive statistics on the various types of volunteer work.
