Nonprofit sector: 80,000 jobs suspended by frozen agreements

A vital sector for Brussels

The nonprofit sector is one of the pillars of the Brussels social economy. With approximately 80,000 jobs, it accounts for a significant share of employment in the Brussels-Capital Region. These workers operate in essential fields: socio-professional integration, personal assistance, early childhood care, mental health, support for people with disabilities, homeless services and integration of newcomers.

The sector's operations rely heavily on multi-year agreements between the Region and associations, accreditations granted by regional and community authorities, and discretionary subsidies that fund the launch or continuation of specific projects.

Since the government entered caretaker mode on 9 June 2024, all three mechanisms have been frozen.

Multi-year agreements: the heart of the problem

The mechanism

Multi-year agreements are funding contracts between the Region (or the Community Commissions) and nonprofit organisations. They typically cover a period of 3 to 5 years and define the missions, objectives and financial resources allocated.

These agreements form the backbone of nonprofit funding. They enable organisations to plan their activities, retain their teams and guarantee continuity of services to beneficiaries.

What is blocked

Dozens of multi-year agreements have expired since June 2024. Under a caretaker government, the regional executive cannot:

• Renew existing agreements that have expired
• Negotiate new agreements with organisations
• Increase financial allocations to account for inflation
• Adapt missions to the evolving needs of the population

Organisations whose agreements have expired generally continue to operate on the basis of tacit renewals or provisional funding. This creates considerable legal and financial uncertainty: organisations do not know what resources they will have in the medium term.

The concrete consequences

According to the CBCS, several organisations have had to:

• Postpone recruitment planned in their staffing plans
• Scale back programmes due to lack of budgetary certainty
• Turn away new beneficiaries for want of guaranteed capacity
• Freeze investments in premises, equipment and digital tools

Source: CBCS, report on the state of the Brussels nonprofit sector, 2025.

Accreditations: the door closed to new services

The principle

Accreditation is the administrative act by which a public authority recognises that an organisation meets the conditions to carry out a specific activity. It determines access to public funding and, in some cases, is a legal requirement to operate.

The impact of the freeze

Since June 2024, no new accreditation has been issued by the Brussels-Capital Region for nonprofit services. In practice:

• New initiatives by existing organisations cannot be launched
• New organisations cannot obtain the recognition needed to operate
• Changes to accreditation (capacity extensions, changes to target groups) are on hold
• Transfers of accreditation in the event of restructuring are complicated

This situation is particularly problematic in neighbourhoods where social needs are most acute. Field projects, sometimes prepared over months, remain shelved for lack of a political decision.

Discretionary subsidies: the freeze on room for manoeuvre

Discretionary subsidies represent the portion of nonprofit funding that depends directly on discretionary political decisions. They fund one-off projects, experimental initiatives and responses to emerging needs.

Under a caretaker government, discretionary subsidy budgets are frozen. Only commitments made before June 2024 are honoured. This means:

• No new regional calls for proposals for the nonprofit sector
• No emergency funding to respond to unforeseen social crises
• No experimentation with new models of social intervention
• No ad hoc support for organisations in financial difficulty

What continues to function

Despite the freeze on decision-making, the Brussels nonprofit sector has not come to a complete standstill:

Structural subsidies

Structural funding committed before June 2024 continues to be disbursed. Organisations with agreements still in force receive their funding instalments. Nonprofit workers' salaries are paid.

The federations

Sectoral federations play a crucial role in coordination and advocacy:

• CBCS (Brussels Council for Socio-Political Coordination) documents the impact of the crisis on the sector and coordinates demands
• FeBISP (Brussels Federation of Socio-Professional Integration Organisations) supports its members in managing the uncertainty
• Brupartners (the Region's Economic and Social Council) continues its advisory missions

Front-line services

Direct services to beneficiaries -- day centres, food aid, individual social support -- continue to operate with existing resources.

The populations most affected

The freeze on the nonprofit sector primarily affects the most vulnerable populations in Brussels:

• People on socio-professional integration pathways, whose programmes are weakened
• Single-parent families who depend on local services
• Newcomers awaiting integration support
• Homeless people for whom new shelter places cannot be created
• Isolated elderly people whose home care services are not being reinforced

Outlook

The Brussels nonprofit sector has significant resilience, but it is not unlimited. The longer the caretaker period continues, the worse the structural consequences become:

• Loss of expertise: qualified workers leave the sector for more stable employment
• Erosion of services: programmes are gradually scaled back for lack of refinancing
• Accumulation of needs: populations not supported today will present heavier needs tomorrow
• Financial fragility: organisations exhaust their reserves and cash flow

Each month without a fully empowered government represents a social debt that the nonprofit sector will have to absorb, with resources that will not have been adapted to the reality of needs.

Main source: CBCS, annual report 2025; FeBISP, sectoral situation note.