Volunteers can help people keep warm

By Frank Neill

Volunteers can spend just three hours and help fill a massive demand in Johnsonville this weekend.

They can help make blankets for people who are homeless or otherwise struggling to keep warm.

The project is organised by Chip Packet Project New Zealand (CPPNZ) and will be held at the Johnsonville Collective Hub from 1:30 to 4:30pm on Sunday 6 August.

Volunteers will be welcomed at the event.

During the afternoon people will use chip packets, as well as other foil packaging, clean them and fuse them into blankets which are then given to people in need.

The packaging is fused by ironing into strips, then joining strips together to make a roughly queen size blanket, then fused with used pallet plastic on the top and bottom, to make it waterproof and seal the heat in.

The latest report of the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment states that more than 100,000 households are struggling to be warm, says Terrena Griffith, the New Zealand founder and coordinator of CPPNZ.

With an average of 2.7 people per household “that means there are over 270,000 people nationwide who are sleeping cold,” she says.

The blanket making project has another major benefit as well. It stops the packaging going into landfills, where it takes around 80 years to decompose.

By making blankets “not only are you helping the planet, but you are also giving someone a warm night’s sleep.

“How good is that,” Terrena says. She set up CPPNZ in September 2021 during lockdown. At that time she was shocked by the economic conditions that were coming and at the fact that more than 30,000 people were homeless in New Zealand, and that figure was going up and up.

Terrena has a friend in the United Kingdom who set up the Chip Packet Project there.

Her friend had a dream one night that she could make blankets out of chip packets. She woke up and gave it a go and the idea worked so she got the project off the ground and it is still going strong today.

The blanket making “is completely reliant on volunteers,” Terrena says.

“You are making something from nothing for people who have nothing.”

CPPNZ donates the blankets the volunteers have made to organisations , including Red Cross and the

Volunteers making blankets during an event earlier this year. Photo: Supplied.

Salvation Army, and the blankets are very much appreciated by those who receive them.

Each blanket takes around four hours to make.

“That’s a lot of love going into