January 07, 2008: Rioting in parts of
Kenya is restricting flower supplies to key markets in Europe,
including the Dutch auctions.
A spokeswoman at FloraHolland, the leading Dutch auction
house, told the Business Daily that between 5-10 per cent
of its normal supplies from Kenya were not reaching the
airport.
That means the flowers are not reaching the auctions and
the major European markets,” she said.
She added that so far, “it is not an enormous impact
on the auction” but that buyers would be keeping a
close eye on the situation in coming weeks.
Kenya is the auction house’s single largest foreign
supplier, with 40 per cent of all supplies coming from abroad.
The auction house sources around a third of its total flowers
from outside the Netherlands.
The coming weeks are a key trading period for flower exporters
with Valentine’s Day next month and Mother’s
Day in March. The UK’s Flowers and Plants Association
said Kenya is an important supplier to the UK for Mother’s
Day as it offers a wide variety of rose colours.
But so far major supermarkets say they have not seen any
disruptions in supply. Marks & Spencer which also buys
Fairtrade tea, coffee and vegetables from Kenya says it
has seen no disruption to supplies so far.
Neither had Sainsbury’s but all supermarkets said
they were monitoring the situation.
Britain’s number two supermarket Asda added in an
emailed statement that it hoped to continue trading with
Kenyan suppliers.
“Many families depend on the revenue generated from
supplying products to ASDA and it would be inappropriate
to cease trading. We will continue to monitor the situation
on an ongoing basis and will review if there is further
deterioration.”
Tim Blackburn, managing director of Finlay’s Flowers
and Flamingo Europe, a leading Kenyan exporter to Europe,
said the firm’s flower supply had not been disrupted
but it has not been able to get tea from its Kericho plantations
to Mombasa.
“We’ve had five days with no shipments from
Kericho because of roadblocks. But tea is not perishable
so we can hold it at source.”
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