Rural Support North Canterbury

What our co-operative groups are doing for our farmers

The North Canterbury Rural Support Trust (NCRST) was first established in 1988 by the late Dorothy Oakley and a group of farming women who were concerned about their menfolk. Since those early days the NCRST has grown to 31 volunteer reps, or facilitators, and extends from the northside of the Rakaia River to Ohau Point, just north of Kaikoura. Our reps are all volunteers who are either farmers themselves or professionals in the farming community. We support rural people who derive the bulk of their income from primary industry.

The farming community has its fair share of challenges every year – these range from climatic events such as droughts, floods, wild winds and earthquakes, to MBovis, Covid-19 and the frequent changes to government regulations. All of these factors take their toll on farmers’ mental health.

We provide a helpline (0800 787 254) for farmers to reach out to us. We travel to where we are needed to offer free and confidential support. For some that’s a chat over a cuppa at the kitchen table, for others professional help is required and we facilitate these contacts. During an adverse event we work closely with the Civil Defence Emergency Management teams to get help to where it’s needed.

We also hold regular community events for our farming families. Over the past year alone these have included Pie Day Fridays, Ladies Lunches, woolshed get togethers, talks by Nigel Latta, and many more. In addition, we partner with other organisations such as Beef + Lamb NZ, Federated Farmers, Rural Women, our local councils - to name but a few - and have a presence at their events. We are also a proud sponsor of Surfing for Farmers, which is a great initiative throughout the whole of NZ and is seeing a huge uptake by our farmers. Anything to get farmers off the farm for a break is to be welcomed and we try to do our bit to help in this area.

We are partially funded by MPI and are fortunate to be the recipient of individual donations and fundraising ventures which allow us to provide much-needed wellbeing support for our hard-working farming communities.

Remember our helpline (0800 787 254) for farmers.

Written by
Arni Smit