The Country 09/06/26: Jack Jensen talks to Jamie Mackay

A part-time Hawke’s Bay sheep and beef farmer, an extreme sports exponent, social media influencer, and rural mental health champion who will be working with Farmstrong at Fieldays.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Here's a young man that I'm looking forward to meeting
at field Days. He'll be at the farmstrong Side. His
name is Jack Jensen. Just to go back a step, Jack,
I want to start with your mental health platform, spark
that chat? How did it start? And even before that,
this is a long winded intro. Sorry, Jack. Tell me
about you and where you're from.

Speaker 2 (00:20):
Yeah, good stuff. So I'm from Hawks Bay, East Coast
and been born and bred here off a sheep and
bee farm, and proudly so went through Hastings Boys High
and all that jazz, which is I'm very proud from
there as well. And then and now what I do.

(00:42):
I'm an extreme sports athlete as well as entrepreneur. We
we're up to all sorts of staff, events, content, where
a media multimedia company as well. We've got a lot
going on. But what brought me into the mental health
space was losing too many mates to sort side. And
I've always lead worth what I do with my heart

(01:05):
and my soul and one hundred percent all on and
from there, you know, really realizing that there's a big
issue here in New Zealand, and not only in my circle,
but so many others that touched our community, especially over
social media. I saw there's a really big issue there

(01:25):
side I started the initiative. At the start, it was
an initiative, a campaign led idea and it was called
Spark that Chat, So doing whatever we can to spark
as many chats and normalizing the conversation around hey, if
you're not feeling all good, just reach on out, you know,

(01:46):
over a coffee, a beer, a water, a cup of tea,
of feed or whatever that is, whether you're on the
farm or whether you're out there surfing or without you're
there on a walk, you know, like just reiterating how
important it is to be there for one another, especially
you know, especially nowadays more than ever an understanding with farmers,
people can get isolated and isolate you themselves. So it's

(02:09):
about just like taking that mental note to reach on
in and reach on out when you need it. And
that's what we're here to do. So now Spark that
Chat is you know, that's five years down the road
and it's a full operating charity. And what we explain
that it's two hills before the cliff, So we're really
promoting how to be well and giving the tools to

(02:32):
be able to do so. Really simple stuff that can
be overlooked.

Speaker 1 (02:35):
Your mental health platform has spark that chat. You're what
we call a social media influencer because last year's campaign
reached one point seven million people, So you've certainly got
cut through. What's the tie to cut the ball because
you're heading around the bull sales as well, aren't you?

Speaker 2 (02:51):
Yeah? Man, Well, well, the one point seven million that
was Future Generations tool. I just spoke to ten thousand
students in ten days in March, and then last year's
bull sale will cut the Ball our second campaign that
we run focused on real mental health, that was six
hundred and fifty thousand people, which is yeah, incredible, And

(03:12):
this year we're very much st to very much surpass
over a million people already across online. And basically what
cut the Ball was all about is doing whatever we
can for our real mental health, like our rural people.
You know, it's where I'm from. I really am super

(03:33):
proud to be a rural bloke and I want to
do whatever I can to help our people, you know,
and these people are the backbone of our country and
I just want to be able to you know, put
a hand up and be like hey, like we see
you and we want to do what we can to
help you. So that's why it's such an epic alliance

(03:56):
with Farm Strong and the work that Farm Strong does.
You know, to be able to promote these things that
you can tap into on farm or off farm and
with cut the Ball, that's exactly what it's about. It's
about having these conversations and learning from one another and
just leading by doing.

Speaker 1 (04:14):
Hey, Jack, you'll be at field Days over the next
three days. Sam Whitelock's going to be there as well.
Just a final question for you. With all this extreme
sport and mental health work you're doing trapesing around the country,
do you ever get time to do any farming on
the Hawks Bay farm just quickly to finish.

Speaker 2 (04:30):
Yeah, good question. Dad will be laughing at that one,
but yeah, absolutely, I do what I can. It's my
happy place, ay. And when there's sheep the crutch or bulls,
the drench or fencing to be done, Dad, you know,
gives me the call up and take the collies out
there and my young boy and we hook into today.
So I try to spend as much time on the

(04:51):
farm as I can. And like I said, man, it's
my happy place and where I can turn the phone
off and just be so yeah. Yeah, a lot of time.

Speaker 1 (05:01):
Hey, Jack Jensen, looking forward to meeting you at field Days.
Keep up the good work and association with Farmstrong, who
are going into bat for farmers in this nation every
day of the week. We'll see you tomorrow Wednesday.

Speaker 2 (05:13):
Yeah, look forward to it mate. We'll see it n