The Auckland City Mission is in desperate need of help now that the Government's stripping funding from community food providers from July 1.
It means the number of food parcels for needy Kiwi families will decline from 50,000 a year to 20,000.
The Auckland City Mission on Friday said it will have to turn families away because the Government has indicated that in the 2024/25 budget there will be very little funding for provision for food, even after a direct appeal from Auckland City Missioner Helen Robinson.
The only funding that has been confirmed is 3.5 percent of the Mission's total spend towards food parcel provision.
"As of July 1st we will receive very, very little money, so $75,000 is what the Mission will receive from Government," Robinson told AM on Tuesday.
She added that she's in in talks with Government officials, including Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston and the Ministry for Social Development, because the Mission needs $1.5 million annually to keep production at the current level.
"Much more importantly actually New Zealand needs, in a conservative estimate, $30 million to just meet the most basic needs of people who literally are hungry. Now that's big money, but when you look at it from across New Zealand that's actually not that much money."
But the reduction comes at a time when hundreds of thousands of Kiwis are needing this kind of support.
"The most conservative estimate is that the reality of food insecurity, so not having enough money for food, affects one in five New Zealanders," Robinson said.
She added that the latest data, released in 2019 from the years 2015 and 2016, shows 19 percent of New Zealand children were food insecure.
Robinson also said those most impacted were also women, especially women raising children alone, as well as Māori and Pacific women.
"So this is a problem obviously at the Mission and in Auckland, but this is a problem throughout our country.
"The reality is that people who don't have access to enough food, enough money for enough food, means that they're not learning, means productivity is not good at our jobs, at our workplaces, means that relationships are strained, means our mental and physical health is impacted.
"And people who are desperate do desperate things - so there is a very, very clear link between people who are hungry and the rise in the need for food and crime associated at supermarkets particularly."
Robinson called on New Zealanders to "stand up and please listen to the plight of our people who are hungry, they need you".
"Yes, this is very obviously a call to Government and a plea to Government to say 'please help us', but this goes much beyond Government and actually goes to our country - we elect any Government, we are a democratic society. We need our Government, we need our people to truly stand with people who are food insecure.
"The group of people who are food insecure are actually growing in breadth and the key indicator here is about income over expenditure, just not enough money coming in against what needs to go out, and none of you will be surprised that the key cost is housing."
Robinson encouraged anyone who can to support their cause. Donations can be made here.
"We need New Zealand to be compassionate, to be brave and courageous."
