Page 7 - ATD13Febr2016
P. 7
U.S. NEWS A7
Saturday 13 February 2016
Those Valentine’s Day flowers might just be from Kenya
ILYA GRIDNEFF flowers would have been
Associated Press
NEW YORK/NYAHURURU, the most profitable part of
Kenya (AP) — This Valen-
tine’s Day, there’s a good the farm,” he said. “Now it is
chance your flowers came
from Kenya. our third after soft fruit and
“I know the flowers are for
giving on Valentine’s Day,” then vegetable crops.”
said Phanice Cherop, a
worker at a flower farm Kenya is the sixth-largest
in Kenya. “They are very
beautiful.” flower exporter to the U.S.,
On a crisp February morn-
ing, Cherop squeezed according to the U.S. Cus-
through a row of shoulder-
high white roses, cut a toms and Border Protec-
flower and methodically
placed it in the bunch she tion. As east Africa’s agri-
carried.
Kenya’s cool climate and cultural powerhouse, Ke-
high altitude make it per-
fect for growing large, nya supplies the European
long-lasting roses. Such
conditions have helped Union with 38 percent of its
make Kenya become the
world’s fourth-biggest sup- cut-flower imports, partly
plier after the Netherlands,
Ecuador and Colombia. due to a tax-exemption
Cherop, a 29-year-old sin-
gle mother of two, works at trade agreement.
AAA Growers’ Simba farm
in Nyahururu, four hours’ Mr. Mules, who farmed in
drive north of the capi-
tal, Nairobi. It’s the one of Zimbabwe before being
company’s four 20-hectare
(50-acre) farms that make evicted under President
them Kenya’s third-larg-
est grower of vegetables Robert Mugabe’s land re-
and flowers combined.
Cherop was one of 600 forms, said prolonged rains Workers pack roses for Valentine’s Day, at the AAA Growers’ farm in Nyahururu, four hours’ drive
workers bused in from sur- north of the capital Nairobi, in Kenya. This Valentine’s Day, there’s a good chance your flowers
rounding villages to pick or due to the El Nino weather came from Kenya as the cool climate and high altitude make it perfect for growing large, long-
pack thousands of roses to lasting roses - propelling it to become the fourth-largest supplier after the Netherlands, Ecuador
be sent around the world pattern have pressured the and Colombia.
ahead of Feb. 14.
Flowers are intricately tied company’s bottom line. (AP Photo/Ilya Gridneff)
to the global economy.
When it collapsed in 2008, “The timing of Valentine’s
the cut-flower trade lost
$1.5 billion the following Day is perfect for Kenya
year. In 2013, global ex-
ports of cut flowers, cut foli- because it falls in the dry
age, living plants and flow-
er bulbs amounted to $20.6 season,” he said. “Unfor-
billion, more than twice the
amount in 2001. tunately, this year, due to
International events, in-
cluding Russia’s war in el Nino, it has lengthened
Ukraine and plummeting
oil prices, have shaped the so called ‘short rains.’
flower fortunes for numer-
ous Kenyan farms. Sales Instead of stopping in No-
to oil-producing nations,
such as Norway and those vember we were getting
in the Middle East, have
dropped due to their re- rain in January.”
duced spending power,
said Britain-born Andrew Another lament is about
Mules, general manager of
AAA Growers’ Simba farm. Russia.
“Up until two years ago,
In 2012, flower exports to
Russia, the world’s fifth-larg-
est flower importer, began
shrinking due to its tanking
economy and depreciat-
ing ruble. Russian military
intervention in Ukraine in
2014 only “worsened the
situation,” said Cindy van
Rijswick, a fruit, vegetables
and floriculture analyst at
Dutch bank Rabobank.
“A more indirect effect is
that, because of the de-
clining cut-flowers exports
to Russia, these flowers are
supplied to other markets,
which causes pressure on
prices,” she said.
Dana Malaskova, AAA
Growers’ commercial man-
ager, said that up until Sep-
tember 2014, the company
was sending a quarter of
their flowers to Russia, with
a steady 5 percent annual
growth; now the volume
has shrunk to 5 percent of
the total.
“We no longer rely on Rus-
sia for International Wom-
en’s day on March 8, the
year’s second-biggest
flower-giving event,” she
said.q
