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Microburbs Property Data API

Suburb - Area Statistics

Volunteering

GET/v1/suburbs/{suburb_name}/area-stats/volunteering5¢ per call

How many adults do voluntary work for an organisation or group, and what share of residents aged 15 and over that is, for every suburb and council area.

Coverage: About 10,500 suburbs and localities and 545 council areas across Australia, in all states and territories (areas with too few people or homes for reliable figures are left out); one snapshot at 10 August 2021. Current to 2021-08-10. Full description, field list and method: /v1/datasets/volunteering.

Exact suburb identifier required. Exact official suburb name (SAL), e.g. Burwood (NSW) — many suburbs carry a state suffix. If starting from free text or an unverified bare name, first call GET /v1/geocode/suburb?q=<text>, then use the exact data[].area_name it returns. Suburb data endpoints do not guess a state or typo-correct names.

Authorization

Bearer tokentest

Sandbox key test works for the allowlisted GNAF + SAL — no signup.

Request

The only values you send. Fields under Responses below are what comes back — you never pass those.

Path parameters

suburb_namestringrequired

Exact official suburb name (SAL), e.g. `Burwood (NSW)` — many suburbs carry a state suffix. If starting from free text or an unverified bare name, first call `GET /v1/geocode/suburb?q=<text>`, then use the exact `data[].area_name` it returns. Suburb data endpoints do not guess a state or typo-correct names.

Query parameters

fieldsstringoptional

Comma-separated subset of: total_aged_15_plus, volunteers_count, volunteers_pct, not_volunteers_count, not_volunteers_pct, volunteering_not_stated_count, volunteering_not_stated_pct. Omit for all.

fromstringoptional

First period to include: 2020, 2020-Q3, 2020-07 or 2020-07-01.

tostringoptional

Last period to include, same formats as `from`.

Responses

Successful Response

application/json

DatasetValuesfields returned to you

datasetstringalways returned

Dataset slug; describe it with /v1/datasets/{slug}.

levelstringalways returned

suburb, lga or block.

areastringalways returned

Canonical name (or mesh-block code) of the area answered.

period_typestringalways returned

snapshot, year, financial_year, quarter or month.

as_ofstring · datealways returned

Date the dataset is current to. Values are never withheld for age; check this instead.

modelledbooleanalways returned

True when the figures are estimates from a model rather than counts or measurements.

fieldsarray of DatasetFieldSeriesalways returned

GET/v1/suburbs/{suburb_name}/area-stats/volunteering

cURL

curl --request GET \
  --url 'https://api.microburbs.com.au/v1/suburbs/Belmont%20North/area-stats/volunteering' \
  --header 'Authorization: Bearer test'

Example Responses

Show schema

{
  "data": {
    "dataset": "volunteering",
    "level": "suburb",
    "area": "Bondi",
    "period_type": "snapshot",
    "as_of": "2021-08-10",
    "modelled": false,
    "fields": [
      {
        "field": "total_aged_15_plus",
        "name": "Residents aged 15 and over",
        "unit": "persons",
        "values": [
          {
            "period": "2021-08-10",
            "period_start": "2021-08-10",
            "value": 9091
          }
        ]
      },
      {
        "field": "volunteers_count",
        "name": "Did voluntary work for an organisation or group",
        "unit": "persons",
        "values": [
          {
            "period": "2021-08-10",
            "period_start": "2021-08-10",
            "value": 1240
          }
        ]
      },
      {
        "field": "volunteers_pct",
        "name": "Did voluntary work for an organisation or group: share of residents aged 15 and over",
        "unit": "%",
        "values": [
          {
            "period": "2021-08-10",
            "period_start": "2021-08-10",
            "value": 13.64
          }
        ]
      }
    ]
  }
}

Successful Response200

application/json

About this dataset

About 10,500 suburbs and localities and 545 council areas across Australia, in all states and territories (areas with too few people or homes for reliable figures are left out); one snapshot at 10 August 2021. Current to 2021-08-10; refreshed five-yearly.

What it is

Residents aged 15 and over who did unpaid voluntary work through an organisation or group in the twelve months before 10 August 2021, for every suburb and council area, against those who did not and those who did not answer.

What it shows

Volunteers, non-volunteers and not stated, each as a head-count and as a share of residents aged 15 and over, plus the total. Counts and shares are separate fields (volunteers_count and volunteers_pct).

Why use it

Volunteering is a measure of community spirit and social connection. Use it to find suburbs with strong community participation, to recruit volunteers for a club, charity, emergency service or event, to judge the community strength behind a local campaign, or to add a community profile to a suburb report. Nationally about 14% of residents aged 15 and over volunteered, down from 2016 as COVID-19 restrictions stopped many activities.

How it is built

Voluntary work means willingly giving unpaid help as a volunteer through an organisation or group; helping family or friends informally is not counted (see unpaid-work-and-care). The twelve months before August 2021 included COVID-19 restrictions that cancelled many volunteer activities, most of all in New South Wales and Victoria. The base is residents aged 15 and over. Areas with fewer than 50 residents aged 15 and over are left out. Our 2021 area statistics, matched to our suburb and council-area names. Figures are a snapshot at 10 August 2021 (the latest full count), so they describe the area then, not today. To protect privacy the source lightly randomises small numbers, so a count of 0, 3 or 6 can be approximate and shares in small areas jump around: check the base field before trusting a percentage. Shares are rounded to two decimals and capped at 100.

Fields

Field	Unit	Description
`total_aged_15_plus` Residents aged 15 and over	persons	All residents aged 15 and over, the base for every share.
`volunteers_count` Did voluntary work for an organisation or group	persons	Number of residents aged 15 and over in the area who: Did voluntary work for an organisation or group (2021 snapshot). Small counts are lightly randomised for privacy.
`volunteers_pct` Did voluntary work for an organisation or group: share of residents aged 15 and over	%	Did voluntary work for an organisation or group as a percent of all residents aged 15 and over in the area.
`not_volunteers_count` Did not do voluntary work	persons	Number of residents aged 15 and over in the area who: Did not do voluntary work (2021 snapshot). Small counts are lightly randomised for privacy.
`not_volunteers_pct` Did not do voluntary work: share of residents aged 15 and over	%	Did not do voluntary work as a percent of all residents aged 15 and over in the area.
`volunteering_not_stated_count` Did not state whether they volunteered	persons	Number of residents aged 15 and over in the area who: Did not state whether they volunteered (2021 snapshot). Small counts are lightly randomised for privacy.
`volunteering_not_stated_pct` Did not state whether they volunteered: share of residents aged 15 and over	%	Did not state whether they volunteered as a percent of all residents aged 15 and over in the area.