Trustees' Report and Accounts

The Donkey Sanctuary's Trustees Report and Accounts for the year ended 31 December 2011 have been prepared in accordance with Accounting and Reporting by Charities: Statement of Recommended Practice 2005 (SORP).

The financial year end for the charity was changed from September to December during 2010, hence the 15 month period of account in 2010. Therefore for the purposes of narrative analysis only within the Trustees Report and Accounts all comparisons with 2010 marked * are made with comparatives being stated as the 12 month equivalent, unless otherwise stated.

Explanatory Notes

Income

Total income for the Charity and its subsidiaries for 2011 grew to £23.6m (2010*: £21.5m) reflecting a combination of the initial stages of our investment in new fundraising strategies together with growth in our legacy pipeline. The benefits of the increases to our donation and legacy income were offset by reductions in trading income as the enduring effect of the recession affected income generated from our trading subsidiaries. It is important to note that 90% of The Donkey Sanctuary's income is from voluntary sources and hence we do rely on the continuing and much valued loyalty of our supporters to be able to continue our work in providing the highest standard of care for donkeys and mules across the world.

Expenditure

Expenditure on our charitable activities was slightly lower than 2010 at £19.5m (2010*- £20.6m) representing 83% (2010*- 96%) of our total incoming resources. This includes £0.8m (2010* - £1.7m) of capital cost of developing new and existing facilities both in the UK and overseas, as well as providing specialist equipment and vehicles. The remaining £18.8m (2010* - £18.9m) represents our operational day-to-day expenditure spent on our core charitable activities of managing our UK farms, providing a welfare support network, training and education, specialist veterinary care and research, and working worldwide. Our work worldwide encompasses our farms in Ireland, our farms and projects in continental Europe as well as five major projects, in Egypt, Ethiopia, India, Kenya and Mexico. We also provide support and advice to a number of other countries including China, South Africa, Morocco, Zambia, Cameroon and Tanzania. In total we worked directly or indirectly in 28 countries in 2011.

Whilst we acknowledge the need to keep our fundraising and governance costs as low as possible thereby ensuring as much of our supporters' donations are available to be spent on the care and welfare of donkeys, we also recognise that we have to continue to invest in the future prosperity of the charity. In 2010 we commenced a programme of investment to develop new and existing fundraising strategies to reach new audiences, to expand awareness of our mission and generate additional income to expand our activities and hence reach more donkeys and mules in need of our help. During 2011 we continued our fundraising strategy and therefore during the year ended 31 December 2011 our fundraising and governance costs increased to 13.8 pence for every £1 of total income generated (2010 - 9.2 pence).

Reserves

The charity's policy regarding reserves is to maintain, as far as is possible, a minimum of free liquid reserves equivalent to at least one year's planned expenditure. At the end of December 2011 the charity's reserves that were freely available were £30.5m, which included £11.1m in respect of legacies for which we had been advised of but for which no cash had been received. After deducting this £11.1m, we arrive at £19.4m which represents 11 months of our planned level of expenditure for the financial year commencing 1st January 2012.

Our reserves reflect not only the resources required to fund the charity's day-to-day operation but also to cover our plans for the future. On 1 January 2012 our smaller “sister” charity The Elisabeth Svendsen Trust for Children and Donkeys ("EST") was merged into The Donkey Sanctuary primarily to remove duplication of work in the administration and general operating activities of each charity and also to simplify fundraising strategies. Our Trustee's Report outlines more detail of our plans for 2012 and we anticipate a similar rate of intake of donkeys in 2012 as the poor economic climate continues to impact on donkeys and mules and their owners across the UK and Europe. In the wider international arena, the Charity will continue to target those who can bring about change in places where donkey welfare is particularly compromised, through the continued use of veterinary care and the development of education and community development programmes. We also intend to enter into discussions and partnerships with other complementary organisations, to see if we can increase the number of projects where we work together thereby enabling us all to be able to expand our areas of operation and reach more donkeys within budgetary restraints.

* Please note that for the purposes of narrative analysis only within the Trustee's Report and Accounts all narrative comparisons with 2010 are made with comparatives being stated as 12 month equivalents, unless otherwise stated.