25 non-profit organisations working in the fields of social welfare, the environment, and biomedical research and associated with the LegadoSolidario.org campaign inform the public about the possibility of including a donation to a cause or charity with which they identify.
According to data from 2015, only 1% of wills made in Spain included a charitable bequest.
“Great things can be achieved with a bequest. #CambiaLosTitularesDelFuturo” (Change the news headlines of the future) is the slogan of the campaign launched today, International Legacy Giving Day, though social medial and digital platforms. Twenty-five of the main charity organisations in Spain, among them Amnesty International, Save the Children, Greenpeace, Doctors without Borders, the Red Cross, the Josep Carreras Foundation, and the Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB Barcelona), among others, are participating in this fundraising initiative.
The campaign, which will last for around a month, seeks to inform and encourage the general public to leave a bequest to a non-profit organisation. “The lack of understanding regarding charitable bequests makes people think it is a complex process. In fact, it is a straightforward inexpensive procedure that respects heirs and makes the will a means through which to make a donation to one or more causes,” explains Sonia Gómez, spokesperson for the LegadoSolidario.org campaign.
A donation made through a will or charitable bequest is a relatively unknown practice in Spain. According to the latest official figures published by the Colegio Notarial de Cataluña in 2015, only 1% of all the wills made in Spain that year included a charitable bequest. The donations pledged through bequests of this nature amounted to 115 million euros and were mostly for the church, and to a lesser extent, to non-profit organisations.
More information. A study by LegadoSolidario.org this year on a sample of 800 people in Spain indicates that 36% of the population over 25 years of age are unaware of the possibility of donating through a charitable bequest. This is explained mostly because of the lack of examples and absence of this topic in the social agenda. According to data from the same study, the percentage of people who report leaving a bequest to an organisation or non-profit entity has increased by 1% in the last five years: 2% in 2013 to 3% in 2018.
The profile of a person who leaves a charitable bequest is a single (53%) woman (62%) and member or donor of the organisation to which the bequest is pledged (69%). The bequest made is generally money, followed by property. Madrid, Catalonia and the Basque Country head the ranking of regions with the most charitable bequests.
“A lot of thought goes into drawing up a will. That is why, for organisations, the receipt of a bequest is a sign of trust and commitment that we greatly value and appreciate. We hope that, little by little, more people will consider this as another way to support causes that are important for them,” explains Anna Merlos, Strategic Projects and Philanthropy Officer at IRB Barcelona. In 2018, IRB Barcelona received its first charitable bequest, amounting to 1.5 million euros, which will be devoted to research into metastasis, and in recent years, more members of the public have expressed their wish to include the institute in their wills.
More information: LegadoSolidario.org
Betevé Notícies Vespre has interviewed Eduard Batlle, coordinator to the Cancer Programme at the Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB Barcelona), about the recent campaign launched by the centre to raise funds for research into metastasis. “We have been studying metastasis at the centre for 10-12 years and have made some important findings. We now feel that it is a timely to push advances in this research, and with greater resources we will be able to speed up the process,” said Eduard Batlle.
The programme “Els Matins” on TV3 has interviewed Francesc Posas, director of the Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB Barcelona), about the campaign #MetastasisChallenge. Launched yesterday, this fundraising initiative seeks to call society to action in the fight against metastasis. In the interview, Posas said, “investing in research, and finding therapies and treatments has an incredible impact, and this is what has been done and demonstrated until now. We have observed that metastasis is the main cause of death in individuals with cancer.
Radio Nacional de España has interviewed Salvador Aznar Benitah, head of the Stem Cells and Cancer lab at IRB Barcelona, about the campaign called #MetastasisChallenge. This initiative seeks to raise € 5 M over four years, funding expected to allow the centre to speed up cancer research by recruiting talent, purchasing new technology and equiping new laboratories, such as a metastasis research unit.
