2017 – a phenomenal year for major gifts

Australian philanthropy has seen big changes in the past five years. 2013 was a record year for Australian giving, with over 50 $1m+ gifts made publicly for the first time, the record for Australia's biggest donation being broken three times, and Andrew and Nicola Forrest becoming the first Australians to join the Giving Pledge, publicly promising to give away at least half of their wealth.

Since then, we've seen major philanthropy continue to grow in Australia, and 2017 was no exception. Here are some of the big gift announcements from last year:

• Australia's richest man, Mr Anthony Pratt, pledged to give away $1 billion during
• his lifetime.
• Andrew and Nicola Forrest pledged to give $400m to six priority areas – cancer, modern slavery, creating parity, early childhood, research, and communities. The Forrests also helped UWA to close its $400m campaign with a $65m gift, and gave $10m to support improved outcomes for brain cancer patients.
• Joining the Forrests as a Giving Pledge signatory in 2017 was billionaire philanthropist Len Ainsworth.
• Australia's richest foundation, the Paul Ramsay Foundation, built on its number one position in last year's AFR Philanthropy 50 by announcing a number of gifts, including a reported $30m per annum to support the Ramsay Centre for Western Civilisation, $24.5m to the Murdoch Children's Research Institute for their Generation V longitudinal study, and $13m to Telethon Kids Institute for their ORIGINS project.
• The Ian Potter Foundation announced multiple new major grant initiatives including $5m towards the University of Tasmania's Creative Industry and Performing Arts (CIPA) project, $4m towards the Ian Potter Southbank Centre for the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music, and multi-million dollar grants to HammondCare, Clontarf Foundation, Guide Dogs Victoria, ANU, Hope Street Youth and Family Services, Seed Foundation, the Australian Ballet, Homes4Homes, and Griffith University.
• The Art Gallery of NSW announced it had reached $88m in philanthropic support for its Sydney Modern project including a $20m gift from Isaac and Susan Wakil, and gifts of $5m or more from the Ainsworth family, the Lowy Family, Kerr Neilson, Mark Nelson and Gretel Packer.

There were several other gifts over $5m:

• Alibaba founder Jack Ma announced a $26.4m gift to the University of Newcastle to fund the Ma & Morley Scholarship Program.
• Flight Centre CEO Graham Turner and his family foundation announced an $18.5m gift to the University of Queensland in support of a wildlife conservation and breeding project.
• Marcus Blackmore and his company announced a joint $10m gift to the National Institute for Complementary Medicine.
• The State Library of Victoria received $8m from John and Miriam Wylie, and another $3m from Allan and Maria Myers, towards their capital refurbishment program.
• Arts philanthropist Judith Neilson gave $6m to fund a Chair in Contemporary Art at UNSW.
• Christine and Bruce Wilson gave $5.5m to fund the Christine and Bruce Wilson Centre for Lymphoma Genomics.
• Hunter Medical Research Institute received an anonymous $5.2m gift to improve access to high quality health care for vulnerable and remote communities across NSW.
• Pamela Galli gave $5m to establish the Lorenzo and Pamela Galli Chair in Medical Biology at the University of Melbourne and the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute.
• The Brazil family gave $5m to the University of Queensland in support of clinical collaboration in stroke and motor neurone disease research.
• Gina Rinehart announced a $5m gift to St Vincent's Private Hospital, Sydney.

Other notable gifts in 2017 included:

• Peter and Ruth McMullin's donation to fund the Peter McMullin Centre on Statelessness at the University of Melbourne.
• Qantas CEO Alan Joyce's $1m donation in support of marriage equality.
• A $3.75m gift by Hong Kong's Li Ka Shing, to support precision oncology research at the University of Melbourne Centre for Cancer Research and the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre. Mr Li is Hong Kong's richest man, and his Li Ka Shing Foundation has given away over US$2.6bn.

FR&C's list of Australian $1m+ donors now features twelve $100m+ donors, seven $50m+ donors, 62 donors with known or estimated giving of $10m+, and another 55 with known giving of $5m+. The total list stands at 334 and can be found here.
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