Save your big weekly grocery shop for Saturday and you’ll help farmers in Wollondilly and across Australia.

All profits from sales of fruit and vegetables, meat, the chilled section, bakery and deli at Woolworths supermarkets nationwide on Saturday, August 11, will be donated to Rural Aid’s Buy a Bale appeal.

Local Woolworths stores are located in Campbelltown Mall, Macarthur Square, Campbelltown Marketfair, Rosemeadow, Eagle Vale, Minto and Ingleburn.

It follows Woolworths’ initial $1.5 million donation, plus further Woolworths Tahmoor fundraising, which is helping Rural Aid deliver more hay, essential items and counselling support services to farmers in need.

The Dilly Drought Drive has now partnered with Rural Aid and under its Buy a Bale scheme, assistance will be provided to farmers in Macarthur and Wingecarribee.

Rural Aid executive officer Charles Alder said the Australian farming community was a resilient one but there was an urgent need for ongoing support for farmers who continue to do it tough during this drought.

“We’ve been overwhelmed by the response of the Woolworths store teams and customers over the past week,” he said.

“Since the supermarket came on board as a partner with their initial $1.5 million donation and opened up fundraising channels in their stores, we’ve been able to provide more certainty to hundreds of farmers who have reached out to us in urgent need of feed for their livestock.

“Additionally we’ve been able to increase vital counselling services available for farming families in regional communities.

“This further boost to funding this Saturday will have a significant impact on the long term support we are going to be able to provide farmers in drought affected regions.”

A Woolworths spokewoman said it had been amazing to see customers and team rally behind Aussie farmers impacted by this drought.

“In less than a week, Woolworths customers nationally have already donated in excess of $600,000 for Rural Aid’s Buy a Bale appeal through our checkouts nationwide,” she said.

“This generosity is making a real difference in rural communities, and has inspired us to build on our support of Rural Aid’s vital work.

Wollondilly customers can also donate to the Buy a Bale appeal in store at Woolworths Tahmoor, or any other Woolworths, Woolworths Metro or Woolworths Petrol store, as well as Woolworths Online.

All donations over $2 are tax deductible and 100% of the funds go to Rural Aid.

Source: Campbelltown- Macarthur Advertiser

The Medowie Bale Out The Drought campaign looks set to smash its fund-raising aim with residents digging deep in the first two weeks to raise more than $14,000.

The aim for the month-long campaign, running until August 12, was to raise $20,000 but Port Stephens councillor Chris Doohan, who is also one of the event organisers, said they had been “overwhelmed” with support.

As of July 29 the campaign had $14,650 in cash and raffle prizes donated.

“It has been sensational, to say the least,” he said. “We’ve even had two young boys empty their piggy banks to donate. That was such a beautiful gesture.”

Seth, aged 9, and Deagan, aged 7, emptied their individual piggy banks and donated the total, $31.10, to the campaign.

The campaign will finish with a final push at the Bull n Bush Hotel in Medowie on August 12 where raffles will be drawn, and auctions will take place.

The money raised will be donated to Rural Aid, an established charity that runs the well-known Buy a Bale campaign.

Mr Doohan said he and event organisers Ben Niland and Rod Kerr have asked Rural Aid to keep the money raised in Medowie in the Hunter.

However, the Mr Doohan said they understood if it could not especially if there were other areas doing it tougher than the Hunter.

According to the NSW Department of Primary Industries, drought is now affecting 99 per cent of the state.

The DPI Combined Drought Indicator shows that the Hunter is among the areas suffering drought and intense drought.

“This campaign has really brought the community together,” Mr Doohan said. “The awareness it has created for this crisis, and it is a crisis, is phenomenal.”

Mr Doohan said he hopes to “pass the baton” to other Port Stephens towns such as Nelson Bay or Raymond Terrace once the Medowie campaign had ended.

Source: Port Stephens Examiner

Central west residents will have another reason to feel good about recycling thanks to a new partnership between Return and Earn and Buy A Bale.

Residents can donate their Return and Earn refunds to NSW farmers and rural communities currently being crippled by drought.

Return and Earn Network operator TOMRA announced the drought relief charity will become an official donation partner on Reverse Vending Machines (RVM’s) from August 27.

It will allow 10c refunds on eligible drink containers to be donated to those affected by the drought.

From August, 27 to November 25, Buy a Bale will appear as an official donation partner on all RVM screens to give recyclers another way to contribute their funds directly into the Buy a Bale relief fund.

Simply return your containers, then choose the ‘donate’ option on the RVM screen and select ‘Buy a Bale’ from the list of four charity partners.

If everyone donated just one of every 10 containers they return, we would raise up to $20,000 a day for NSW farmers

Ryan Buzzell, TOMRA CEO

The money will go towards rural NSW farmers and communities struggling to survive the harsh drought plaguing the state – providing them with much needed support like hay and other essentials to give them a fighting chance in these tough times.

But for those residents looking to donate to farmers immediately they can use a special ‘Buy a Bale’ barcode when visiting any of the 270 RVMs across the state.

The 10c per container refund will then be automatically sent to the Buy a Bale drought relief fund.

TOMRA CEO Ryan Buzzell said after seeing the harsh reality facing farmers and being inspired by the wider NSW community’s eagerness to band together, they were keen to get involved.

“With an average of two million containers being returned every day across NSW, if everyone donated just one of every 10 containers they return, we would raise up to $20,000 a day for NSW farmers,” he said

“So we’re encouraging everyone to give as generously as they can over the next four months.”

Every 200 containers returned will provide one small hay bale for farmers in need.

Plus every 1,100 containers returned will purchase a large hay bale, and every 95,000 containers returned is the equivalent of a semi-trailer load of hay.

Rural Aid CEO, Charles Alder, said even at the best of times, farmers and rural communities are faced with some of the most severe conditions, so every donation, no matter how small, can mean the difference between devastation and survival.

“All it takes is something as simple as a bale of hay or a container refund donation to serve as a reminder that the rain might have dried up but Australians’ willingness to support each other never will,” Mr Alder said.

The ‘Buy a Bale’ barcode can be found on the myTOMRA Australia Facebook page or at www.mytomra.com.au, and scanned before recycling at the front of every RVM.

Source: Western Magazine 

Penrith Panthers is leading the charge to help drought-stricken western NSW farmers survive unprecedented conditions.

The club will give $100,000 to the Buy A Bale Western NSW campaign – a partnership between Fairfax Media,Macquarie Radio and charity Buy A Bale – in Sydney on Friday.

The vital injection is equivalent to about 900 round bales of hay.

But the club isn’t stopping there.

Panthers general manager Phil Gould will make another drought-support announcement on Channel 9 on Thursday.

It comes after Woolworths pledged its support for farmers with a $1.5 million donation to the overall Buy A Bale campaign.

The supermarket giant has put $1.2 million of this towards buying hay, water and groceries for struggling farming families.

The remaining $300,000 will fund two extra counsellors in Rural Aid’s mental health program, the first face-to-face farmer counselling service in NSW.

Rural Aid CEO and Buy A Bale founder Charles Alder said more than 70 farmers were registering for assistance across the state every week and he expected that number to rise as conditions became worse.

Truck loads of hay have been arriving at farms across western NSW since the campaign started in June.

“Every donation, no matter how big or small, helps to provide some relief to our farmers,” he said.

You can donate or register for assistance at buyabale.com.au 

Source: Western Advocate