Feeding the Paetūmōkai community with electric wheels

Soft, melodic music plays. See Elaine Corlett, Manager, Featherston Foodbank, standing outside in front of a white EV van. The background includes a large, light-coloured building with a corrugated roof, some trees and distant green hills under a cloudy sky. The lighting is natural daylight.

Elaine Corlett: “To me, being part of the community is being of service. And this is how I could serve my community.”

The white EV van is parked with its boot open, revealing boxes and crates that contain food supplies for the foodbank. Elaine is unpacking the van and bringing crates of food inside to the storage area. 

See Peter Trafford, Trust Board Member of Paetūmōkai Charitable Trust, talking to camera in the foodbank storage room. 

Peter Trafford: “The trust aims to do good for the people of Featherston or Paetūmōkai. And it does it from a range of places.” 

See the trust’s op shop with shelves of secondhand goods, clothing racks and volunteers sorting items. See drone footage of the resource recovery centre with people dropping off or picking up items for reuse. 

Peter Trafford: It's got the op shop, which was the first thing that kicked off, and then A Mua, which is the resource recovery centre, and the food bank sort of just sprang from the proceeds of that really.”

See the foodbank with volunteers packing boxes of food and fresh produce into the white EV van. The visuals emphasise community activity, teamwork and the variety of services provided. 

Peter Trafford: “It was about making use of the proceeds of the op shop, reinvesting that back into the people. We came across Meridian's Community Decarbonization Fund, as a way to access a better motor travel basically.”

See the EV van driving through the town, picking up and delivering food and supplies. The e-van is shown in use, See drone footage of the van driving along local, rural community roads. The visuals highlight the ease and efficiency of the electric van and the positive impact on the community.

Elaine Corlett: “In our community, there were elderly, there were sick, there were young families with no petrol, no car.”

See drone footage of the resource recovery centre. See Elaine backing the car into the facility, opening her door and getting out of the EV van. Elaine and another volunteer unpack the van and bring boxes and crates of food into the foodbank. See close ups of some of the produce, including potatoes, lettuce, apples and bread. 

Elaine Corlett: “So our volunteers would deliver parcels on their way home or go out of their way to pick up vegetables from Greytown. You know, they did this out of their own pocket and their own time. 

The camera shows the new EV parked, the camera slowly pans around it to show its great features. Drone footage shows the van driving through the rural community. See the van backing into a food rescue location to pick up more food. 

Elaine Corlett: Having the e-van available 24/7 to be able to do these things has been absolutely fantastic. It's so easy on the pocket that that means that the funds that the board get can be distributed back out into the community in other ways or go to buying food for the food bank.”

See volunteers writing on a whiteboard in the foodbank storage room, then continue packing food into the EV van. 

See Guy Walker, Manager of A Mua Paetūmōkai Resource Recovery Centre, standing in front of the recovery centre. 

Guy Walker: I felt I needed to try and do something, um, to help our community become more resilient. And also to kind of try and stem the flow of things going to landfill before their time, and to reduce the amount of unnecessary consumption. Also giving our community access to resources, um, that help them live in a more sustainable way as well.

See Guy Walker and some volunteers sorting items for recycling or re-use and putting a lawnmower into a tool shed for storage. Drone footage about the recovery centre shows materials sorted into piles for recycling. 

See a sign for the tool library that where the community can borrow tools, its open on Saturday’s. The visuals focus on sustainability, teamwork and the effort to reduce waste. Volunteers are seen working together, laughing and loading supplies. 

Guy Walker: “Now that we have the second vehicle, the EV, it just means we have more access to the truck, which we used to share with the foodbank. So it's been really helpful. I'm lucky enough to have a great volunteer staff, so we're a real team down here. Hopefully we can keep this going and grow it and maybe we'll act as an example to, um, other communities that might want to do something similar.”

See the Meridian logo appear on screen and the soft, melodic music fades out.