National not-for-profit organisation, Animal Rescue Cooperative (ARC), has turned to the trucking community to ask for help in getting donated goods from A to B.
ARC supports animal rescuers, peak bodies and emergency responders to help animals in times of need, including bushfires, floods and drought.
Run entirely by volunteers across 26 hubs nationally, it distributes food, medical supplies, craft and rescue items across a national network of rescuers.
Thanks to the generosity of many, ARC has grown in leaps and bounds, and with that, so has its freight task.
“We get donated hundreds of pallets every year and we need to move them all around Australia to our hubs so they can continue to support their local rescue groups. As you can appreciate, this is a very expensive task, and it takes away much needed funds for us to be able to support rescuers,” said Rebecca Alexander.
An ARC volunteer, Alexander runs one of the organisation’s hubs in south-east SA and coordinates all of the transport and logistics operations nationally, honing in on her industry experience.
She worked in a transport business for 15 years and her husband is also a truckie. Along with her work with ARC, she – like many of the volunteers – also runs her animal rescue organisation, called Orphan Lamb Rescue Farm.
Between the couple’s work in transport, they contacted numerous industry contacts to see if they could help move pallets. “We had about 30 companies that came on board and were happy to help us transport pallets,” Alexander said, adding that there is still so much more freight that needs to be moved.
“For example, we recently had 450 pallets of Royal Canin dog food that was donated, which weren’t expected, so we didn’t have a big budget for transport. We had to pay for some of those pallets to be moved. Page Transport and Tasfreight both took about 15 pallets each to Tassie for free, which was great.
“Transport costs can kill us so we have to look at if it’s worth sending the goods due to the costs,” she added. “If you have pallet spaces spare on a trailer going from A to B, chances are we have a pallet we need to get there.
“When we send medical supplies out for floods or bushfires, we send pallets of dog food too – it’s not just for the rescuers but also for the locals who have been impacted. Recently, we’ve done a lot in Queensland with the floods there.”
As Canberra is ARC’s medical hub, there is often a need to transport medical supplies from there to other parts of the country, however supplies are transported from various locations to where they are needed.
If you’re a transport operator or a truckie who can help to transport pallets of stock, please contact Rebecca@arcsupport.org.au or visit the website or Facebook page for more information.