New Zealanders are giving slightly less to needy causes than we did four years ago - but we are still the world's third-most-generous people.
A three-yearly update by Philanthropy NZ estimates that people, businesses and trusts donated 1.17 per cent of our national income last year, down from 1.34 per cent in 2011.
The drop is put down to the end of a short-term surge in giving for victims of the Christchurch earthquakes in 2011.
But New Zealand still ranked third out of 145 countries in a World Giving Index published by London-based Charities Aid Foundation last month, which is based on Gallup polls asking people whether they helped a stranger, donated money to a charity and volunteered time in the past month. Only Burma and the United States ranked higher.
Gallup does not ask how much people donated to charities, but New Zealand's 1.17 per cent of national income also ranks highly in a small sample reported by Philanthropy NZ - below the United States (2 per cent), but well above Britain (0.76 per cent), Australia (0.68 per cent) and Canada (0.65 per cent).
In dollar terms, New Zealanders donated almost exactly the same as four years ago: $2.789 billion in 2011, and $2.788 billion last year.
Personal donations by individuals dropped by 4 per cent to $1.373 billion, despite the growing phenomenon of web-based crowd-funding sites such as Givealittle, which has seen its donations skyrocket from $748,000 in 2011 to $12.3 million last year and $19 million so far this year.
Business donations jumped from $59 million in 2010 to $99 million in 2011, but fell back to between $70 million and $77 million in each of the past three years.
"It seems likely businesses made a significant one-off response to the Christchurch earthquakes in 2011," the report says.
Donations from pokie trusts also fell by 4 per cent to $301 million, reflecting a 6 per cent fall in New Zealanders' spending on pokies from 2011 to last year.
However these declines were roughly balanced by higher bequests from individuals (up 29 per cent to $157 million) and increased grants from energy and community trusts and from the Lottery Grants Board.
Philanthropy NZ chief executive Liz Gibbs said the 2011 survey, swollen by donations to Christchurch, "set the generosity bar very high".
"So it's pleasing to find that total giving during 2014 was almost identical to total giving during 2011, despite the lack of a natural disaster to prompt our generosity," she said.
The data for individual donations, based on Nielsen surveys of 12,000 people every quarter, shows that New Zealanders gave the most to churches and other religious activities, which received 33 per cent of total personal donations.
The other recipients were culture and recreation (19 per cent), health (17 per cent), education including school donations (10 per cent), overseas aid (9 per cent), social services and community development (9 per cent) and the environment (4 per cent). This breakdown was not available for previous years.
The World Giving Index placed New Zealand fourth for volunteering time, with 45 per cent of Kiwis saying they volunteered time in the past month, not far behind top-ranked Burma (50 per cent).
We came sixth for donating money. Three-quarters (73 per cent) of us donated money in the past month, although this was well behind Burma's 92 per cent.
But New Zealand did not make the Top 10 for helping a stranger. Only 65 per cent of us said we had helped a stranger in the past month. The top-ranked country on this score was Iraq, with 79 per cent.