Victoria has been labelled Canada’s most generous city in GoFundMe’s annual Year in Giving Report for 2020.
The report, which was released on Tuesday, says that Victoria took the top spot due to having more donations per capita than any other city in Canada.
Victoria rated above another British Columbian city, Kelowna, which landed in the second spot in GoFundMe’s report.
Rounding out the top five were Kingston in third, Saskatoon in fourth and Calgary in fifth.
GoFundMe highlights Victoria’s “generosity” by pointing to 2020 campaigns like saving the local Beacon Hill animal farm to marathoning to support single parents.
The 2020 Year in Giving Report comes 10 years after GoFundMe officially launched in Canada. The organization says that since 2010, over half a billion CAD has been raised on GoFundMe, while suggesting that 1 in 7 Canadians give generously on the platform.
When looking at some of the other stats from the 2020 report, GoFundMe highlights that this year, 70% of all donations were under $50 – something being referred to as ‘microgiving.’
The report also indicates that Canadians donated more than 30,000 times on June 2, which marks the most generous day “not only of 2020 but of all time.”
Other notable fundraisers from around British Columbia in 2020 are outlined below:
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Gidimt’en Strong ($364K raised) – Indigenous allies helped to protest against Coastal GasLink pipeline plans through Wet’suwet’en territory and recognized First Nations stewardship and sovereignty over the land.
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Black Lives Matter Vancouver ($512K raised) – Support poured in for the fight against systemic racialized violence and the struggles that marginalized groups in British Columbia still face today.
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Aryan’s Fight Against SMA ($2.8M raised) and Life For Lucy ($2.4M raised) – Donors helped save the lives of these two babies diagnosed with the rare and debilitating disease Spinal Muscular Atrophy, and helped shine a light on its $3M life-saving treatment.
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McIntosh Family Affected by Covid-19 ($87K raised) – Abbotsford mother gave birth to her son through emergency C-section while in an induced coma due to Covid-19 and donations came in to help the family with the financial impact.
Canada was rated as the fourth most generous country by GoFundMe as well.
The full Year in Giving Report for 2020 can be found here.
Graham Cox
