Which countries did Gates and other philanthropies fund the most?
Between 2019 and 2023, the Gates Foundation and other philanthropies have provided a total of $57.3 billion in aid. Who funded the most? Where did the money go? Devex crunched the numbers to find out.
Amid growing uncertainty, the global community is turning its focus to philanthropies — the only major source of funding that looks likely to grow in the next year. From time to time, philanthropies will issue funding through an open call, and information on these can be found on the Devex Funding Platform. Among the biggest philanthropies are: • Gates Foundation • Mastercard Foundation • Wellcome • Open Society Foundations • Children’s Investment Fund Foundation • Susan T. Buffett Foundation • Ford Foundation • Howard G. Buffett Foundation • Bloomberg Family Foundation • IKEA Foundation The collective efforts of these philanthropies have the potential to rival the largest bilateral donors, but do they have enough capacity to shoulder the weight of the decline of the world’s biggest provider of aid? In order to find out, we used the Private Philanthropy for Development dataset from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. OECD used the available data provided by 40 of the biggest philanthropies in the world. Some of the figures may contain inaccuracies, because OECD provided estimates for some donors that have not reported complete details to them. OECD has presented the data in the same statistical manner as it would with other ODA-related data. The figures are presented in 2023 constant prices, unless stated otherwise. From 2019 to 2023, private philanthropies gave a total of $57.3 billion in funding. In 2023 alone, the donors came together to provide a total of almost $12 billion. The peak was in 2021, during the COVID-19 pandemic, when $12.5 billion was provided. <div class='tableauPlaceholder' id='viz1764235825184' style='position: relative'><noscript><a href='#'><img alt='Dashboard 1 ' src='https://public.tableau.com/static/images/Ph/Philanthropy-YearonYear/Dashboard1/1_rss.png' style='border: none' /></a></noscript><object class='tableauViz' style='display:none;'><param name='host_url' value='https%3A%2F%2Fpublic.tableau.com%2F' /> <param name='embed_code_version' value='3' /> <param name='site_root' value='' /><param name='name' value='Philanthropy-YearonYear/Dashboard1' /><param name='tabs' value='no' /><param name='toolbar' value='yes' /><param name='static_image' value='https://public.tableau.com/static/images/Ph/Philanthropy-YearonYear/Dashboard1/1.png' /> <param name='animate_transition' value='yes' /><param name='display_static_image' value='yes' /><param name='display_spinner' value='yes' /><param name='display_overlay' value='yes' /><param name='display_count' value='yes' /><param name='language' value='en-US' /><param name='filter' value='publish=yes' /></object></div><param name='device' value='desktop' /><param name='showShareOptions' value='false' /> <script type='text/javascript'> var divElement = document.getElementById('viz1764235825184'); var vizElement = divElement.getElementsByTagName('object')[0]; if ( divElement.offsetWidth > 800 ) { vizElement.style.width='100%';vizElement.style.height=(divElement.offsetWidth*0.75)+'px';} else if ( divElement.offsetWidth > 500 ) { vizElement.style.width='100%';vizElement.style.height=(divElement.offsetWidth*0.75)+'px';} else { vizElement.style.width='100%';vizElement.style.height='727px';} var scriptElement = document.createElement('script'); scriptElement.src = 'https://public.tableau.com/javascripts/api/viz_v1.js'; vizElement.parentNode.insertBefore(scriptElement, vizElement); </script> <i style=font-style: georgia;”>Year-on-year donor contributions, according to OECD data.</i> What does the preliminary data tell us? So far, two philanthropies have provided information about their funding in 2024. Gates has reported $5.4 billion, and Good Ventures reported $198.7 million. Who were the biggest philanthropies? Topping the list is Gates. In 2023, Gates gave a total of $5.5 billion. Gates is followed by the Mastercard Foundation, with $1.3 billion. Wellcome comes next, with $887.7 million. The Open Society Foundations comes next, with $590.3 million, and then the Howard G. Buffett Foundation gave $457.9 million. <div class='tableauPlaceholder' id='viz1764236267205' style='position: relative'><noscript><a href='#'><img alt='Dashboard 2 ' src='https://public.tableau.com/static/images/Ph/Philanthropy-TopDonors/Dashboard2/1_rss.png' style='border: none' /></a></noscript><object class='tableauViz' style='display:none;'><param name='host_url' value='https%3A%2F%2Fpublic.tableau.com%2F' /> <param name='embed_code_version' value='3' /> <param name='site_root' value='' /><param name='name' value='Philanthropy-TopDonors/Dashboard2' /><param name='tabs' value='no' /><param name='toolbar' value='yes' /><param name='static_image' value='https://public.tableau.com/static/images/Ph/Philanthropy-TopDonors/Dashboard2/1.png' /> <param name='animate_transition' value='yes' /><param name='display_static_image' value='yes' /><param name='display_spinner' value='yes' /><param name='display_overlay' value='yes' /><param name='display_count' value='yes' /><param name='language' value='en-US' /><param name='filter' value='publish=yes' /></object></div><param name='device' value='desktop' /><param name='showShareOptions' value='false' /> <script type='text/javascript'> var divElement = document.getElementById('viz1764236267205'); var vizElement = divElement.getElementsByTagName('object')[0]; if ( divElement.offsetWidth > 800 ) { vizElement.style.width='100%';vizElement.style.height=(divElement.offsetWidth*0.75)+'px';} else if ( divElement.offsetWidth > 500 ) { vizElement.style.width='100%';vizElement.style.height=(divElement.offsetWidth*0.75)+'px';} else { vizElement.style.width='100%';vizElement.style.height='727px';} var scriptElement = document.createElement('script'); scriptElement.src = 'https://public.tableau.com/javascripts/api/viz_v1.js'; vizElement.parentNode.insertBefore(scriptElement, vizElement); </script> <i style=font-style: georgia;”>The top philanthropies of 2023, according to OECD data.</i> Which countries received the most? Regionally, the African region received the most money from philanthropies. The region received $4.5 billion in total. Gates gave $1.7 billion. Followed by the Mastercard Foundation, with $1.2 billion. Asia received $1.3 billion. Its biggest donor is Gates, with $749.1 million, followed by the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation, with $107.3 million. The Americas region got almost $600 million. Its biggest providers are the Howard G. Buffett Foundation, with $94.2 million, and the Open Society Foundations, with $87.6 million. Europe follows with $441.2 million, with the Howard G. Buffett Foundation giving $353 million, and OSF, $52.2 million. Lastly, Oceania received $7 million. Wellcome is its biggest donor with almost $3 million, and then Gates, with $2 million. There are projects meant to serve multiple countries around the world. These projects are classified as “Developing countries, unspecified.” Projects labeled as such received around $5.1 billion, most of which was funded by Gates, with $3 billion. In 2023, Kenya was the biggest recipient of philanthropic aid to an individual country. It received a total of $553 million. The biggest donor was the Mastercard Foundation, providing $229.4 million in funding. It is followed by the Gates Foundation, which provided nearly $139 million. Wellcome follows with almost $60 million, then the Good Ventures Foundation, with $54 million, and then the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation, or CIFF, with $15.4 million. Ethiopia comes next, receiving a total of $452.4 million. Its biggest donor is Gates, which provided $163 million. Mastercard follows, with $139.4 million. The Susan T. Buffett Foundation gave $70.4 million, and then Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust gave $24.2 million. India received a total of $441.6 million. Its biggest donor is Gates, which provided $299 million. CIFF followed and gave $52.2 million. The Michael and Susan Dell Foundation gave $29.7 million, which is followed by the Good Ventures Foundation, with $13.3 million, and then the Wellcome Trust, with nearly $10 million. <div class='tableauPlaceholder' id='viz1764237026443' style='position: relative'><noscript><a href='#'><img alt='Dashboard 3 ' src='https://public.tableau.com/static/images/Ph/Philanthropy-TopRecipients/Dashboard3/1_rss.png' style='border: none' /></a></noscript><object class='tableauViz' style='display:none;'><param name='host_url' value='https%3A%2F%2Fpublic.tableau.com%2F' /> <param name='embed_code_version' value='3' /> <param name='site_root' value='' /><param name='name' value='Philanthropy-TopRecipients/Dashboard3' /><param name='tabs' value='no' /><param name='toolbar' value='yes' /><param name='static_image' value='https://public.tableau.com/static/images/Ph/Philanthropy-TopRecipients/Dashboard3/1.png' /> <param name='animate_transition' value='yes' /><param name='display_static_image' value='yes' /><param name='display_spinner' value='yes' /><param name='display_overlay' value='yes' /><param name='display_count' value='yes' /><param name='language' value='en-US' /><param name='filter' value='publish=yes' /></object></div><param name='device' value='desktop' /><param name='showShareOptions' value='false' /> <script type='text/javascript'> var divElement = document.getElementById('viz1764237026443'); var vizElement = divElement.getElementsByTagName('object')[0]; if ( divElement.offsetWidth > 800 ) { vizElement.style.width='100%';vizElement.style.height=(divElement.offsetWidth*0.75)+'px';} else if ( divElement.offsetWidth > 500 ) { vizElement.style.width='100%';vizElement.style.height=(divElement.offsetWidth*0.75)+'px';} else { vizElement.style.width='100%';vizElement.style.height='727px';} var scriptElement = document.createElement('script'); scriptElement.src = 'https://public.tableau.com/javascripts/api/viz_v1.js'; vizElement.parentNode.insertBefore(scriptElement, vizElement); </script> <i style=font-style: georgia;”>The top recipients of 2023, according to OECD data.</i> Try out Devex Pro Funding today with a free five-day trial, and explore funding opportunities from over 850 sources in addition to our analysis and news content.
Amid growing uncertainty, the global community is turning its focus to philanthropies — the only major source of funding that looks likely to grow in the next year.
From time to time, philanthropies will issue funding through an open call, and information on these can be found on the Devex Funding Platform.
Among the biggest philanthropies are:
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Alecsondra Si is a Junior Development Analyst at Devex. She analyzes funding data from bilateral and multilateral agencies, foundations, and other public and private donors to produce content for Devex Pro and Pro Funding readers. She has a bachelor’s degree in International Studies - major in European Studies from De La Salle University, Manila, Philippines.
