Home Page - Meat the Need

You can feed a family today.

Text FEED to 2662 to donate $3.

HAVE LIVESTOCK?

Have you got livestock to donate?
We can accept cattle, sheep and deer.

MAKE A DONATION

If you can’t donate livestock,
you can still join our mission.

DONATE MILK - FONTERRA OR MIRAKA

Got milk to donate?
Donate milk through Fonterra or Miraka

Mince and milk meals delivered

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Food banks and community organisations nationwide

SILVER FERN FARMS

We believe Silver Fern Farms can create positive change for our environment, our people, and our communities. We care deeply about doing the right thing and doing it well, striving every day to be the world’s most successful and sustainable grass-fed red meat company. With 14 processing sites across the country we are perfectly placed to help Meat the Need take donations all the way through the supply chain – from the farmer to the recipient. All New Zealanders should be able to eat red meat, and we’re proud to support Meat the Need in making that a reality.

FONTERRA

We are a New Zealand Co-operative made up of everyday good people who work together to do amazing things with dairy, we are passionate about supporting our communities and its through our philosophy of Doing Good Together that we intend to care for people, the environment and our co-op for generations. We are humbled to partner with Feed Out by Putting good quality nutrition into the hands of those who need it the most from our farming families to New Zealand communities, we intend to make a positive difference.

MIRAKA

Miraka is New Zealand’s, and the world’s, first dairy processing company to use renewable geothermal energy, providing one of the lowest manufacturing carbon emissions footprints that there is globally. Established in 2010 by a small group of Māori trusts, and founded upon a te ao Māori worldview, Kaitiakitanga – guardianship of our natural environment – is one of our core values. Miraka is New Zealand’s second-largest, Māori-owned global export company, exporting $300 million worth of premium dairy products to customers around the world. We’re proud to partner with Feed Out, who supply our dairy farmer’s milk donations to food banks and community organisations throughout Aotearoa New Zealand.”

A Peek into our process

Talk to farmers

Farmers are generous and caring community members, and they let us know they want to donate cash, milk or livestock to feed NZ families.

Collect the Animal/Milk

Together Meat The Need and Silver Fern Farms arrange the collection and processing of the donated livestock from the farmer. For milk donations, this is arranged with our partners Fonterra and Miraka.

Link the need

Meat The Need staff speak with community organisations who feed New Zealanders in need and we arrange the safe and regular delivery of our donated meat or milk to them.

Deliver the goods

Through our distribution network, we deliver the donated meals to key locations around NZ that can send out smaller quantities when our community organisations need it. We monitor to make sure our deliveries are timely and respond to changing demand from our food banks and organisations.

Share the results

Communicate with our partners, sponsors and donors the impact that our charity is making as regularly as we are able, via our website and email newsletter, as well as our social media platforms. We want to ensure that each milk or meat meal donated reaches the families in need.

SUPPORTERS

It’s thanks to all these fantastic businesses that we have been able to feed families across New Zealand.

DairyNZ is proud to support Meat the Need. It’s great to see a farmer-led project supporting those in need in the community in this challenging time by providing families with high quality nutritious food.

Meat the Need is a project initiated after an act of ‘giving’ during one of my daily challenges as the YOLOFarmer. Every day I look to do something to say that I’ve lived for that day. On this day, upon giving meat to our local food bank I realised how little it would take to help those in need in our local communities.

There is a clear need for supporting the vulnerable in our community in being able to have quality protein as part of their diet, which unfortunately for many, is beyond their means. Federated Farmers is proud to support this endeavour… I believe this charity Meat the Need, will make a huge difference in a very real sense to the lives of thousands of New Zealanders.

Farmers are very committed to supporting their communities and I know they often donate product off their own bat to people in need of support. We wanted to design a process that allowed the food banks to plan and receive meat in a regular way, but that farmers can donate whenever they have the ability.

Our hope is that Meat The Need, with the support of Ag Proud NZ will ensure access to food is not an issue for those in need because this is a hand up not a hand out. We will be working with the rural community to encourage support and donations to the cause. Utilising our networks to help with distribution into isolated communities and spread the word so that if Kiwis need help, they know farmers have got their backs.

Beef + Lamb New Zealand is proud to support Meat the Need. This excellent farmer-led initiative gives farmers and farming organisations the opportunity to support the most vulnerable in our communities by providing them with high quality protein