INKEx Launches Report On Irish Nonprofits, Ceases Trading
Submitted by paulmeade on 7 February 2012 - 7:12pm
Irish Nonprofits: What Do We Know?, launched on Monday, 6 February by INKEx (Irish Nonprofits Knowledge Exchange) is a report derived from the first-ever and only regulatory database of Irish nonprofits.
Speaking at the launch of the report, the Chairman of INKEx, Mr Ian Duffy, thanked the many hundreds of people and nonprofits who had cooperated in making the project a success to date.
He said that INKEx, which is itself a small nonprofit company, had set out to build an infrastructure for nonprofits, serving the sector itself, government, philanthropy and other stakeholders, and funded by government
and philanthropies.
It was greatly to be regretted, he said, that despite goodwill from numerous quarters, it had not been possible to assemble the complete funding consortium necessary to keep the service going, and as a result, INKEx had ceased trading at the end of January.
"We believed that as active citizens, we could make a contribution to everyone's understanding of this sector"
"We realise that infrastructure-building is normally the work of Government", he
said. "However, at INKEx, we saw no reason why a nonprofit company like ours shouldn't work in cooperation with partners in government and the nonprofit sector, re-using public information to build an infrastructure for nonprofits. We believed that as active citizens, we could make a contribution to everyone's understanding of this sector, and hence to better decision-making. It's difficult to see how long-term strategic decisions can be made without such shared information."
"We would have liked this report to be the first in an annual series. Now that we are leaving the field, we sincerely hope that Government have alternative plans to ensure that the critical strategic, execution and funding decisions that lie ahead are informed and balanced and that the appropriate infrastructure is put in place to deliver this."
Until now, because the sector is still unregulated, there has been no source of consistent and detailed information about nonprofits on which to build an accurate picture for the benefit of the sector itself, for the public, for government, for donors.
By re-using public information, the Irish Nonprofits Database was the only available source of regulatory data about the sector (pending the commencement of the provisions of the Charities Act, 2009) and Irish Nonprofits: What Do We Know? is the first report to give a picture of what the database tells us.
Download the Full Report
The report provides a range of insights into the sector, including:
- An analysis of the sector using the UN‐recognised classification into 12 sub-‐sectors (health, environmental protection, religion etc.)
- A detailed breakdown of the sources of revenue within the sector at large, and sector-by-sector.
- An analysis of the numbers of employees and voluntary directors of nonprofit companies.
- An institutional analysis, showing the breakdown as between incorporated
- and unincorporated nonprofits, and those that have been granted tax exempt status by the Revenue.
- A couple of case studies (Co Kildare, and Philanthropy) illustrating how the database can be used to illuminate individual areas or topics.
Download the full report here (PDF, 2.1MB)
More Information
Texts and photographs from the launch will be available shortly on: www.irishnonprofits.ie
Contact: Patricia Quinn, CEO of INKEx, on: 087 648 8441 or patricia@inkex.ie.
