Hastings woman shifts foodbank into her home

Carleen Te Nahu at the foodbank temporarily set up at her home. Photo / Supplied

When Presbyterian Support East Coast/Family Works had to quickly leave the building which it had operated a foodbank out of for 10 years, a staff member transformed her Hastings home into a temporary foodbank.

Family Works Hawke's Bay clinical team leader Carleen Te Nahu didn't think twice about using her Flaxmere home as a space for the Family Works foodbank when they had to move out of their former Hastings premises in three days due to earthquake risk.

"It was just an automatic thing that I along with my team packed down the foodbank and move it to my house. And part of that is because families still need food, I was just going to make it happen one way or another," she said.

Her office now takes up one room of her house and the foodbank complete with shelving, two freezers and the food.

She picks up donations from collection points, packs items there and then other staff members or herself deliver them.

Parcels include canned food, cereal, milk, coffee, pasta, rice tea, frozen meat and vegetables, sanitary and toiletry items and when available biscuits, muesli bars and baby food if needed.

"Not just the standard Weetbix and baked beans," Te Nahu tries to tailor the parcel to the needs of each family.

Currently about four to five people a week receive food parcels from them but when fruit picking season ends it can be up to 10.

"It's really nice to see the faces on children when they know they will have something for tea tonight... it all makes it worthwhile.

"I believe everybody deserves the best in life... we need to be helping each other and supporting families and encouraging families to work together, live safely and create positive memories for their children.

"And if that means that us delivering a food parcel every now and again is going to help then, I'm okay with that."

Over the Christmas period 85 food and gift parcels were distributed.

She said being able to include gifts made a difference to families. "Yay, my kids will have something to open!" Being a typical reaction.

Family Works service manager Pam McCann said the impact of Covid-19 on the families they support was high with unemployment and uncertainty affecting them.

She said due to generous donations they were able to have enough food to meet the demand for families.

Family Works are searching for new premises for their foodbank and staff offices.