Cold weather has caused a 20 percent drop in Kenya's production of fresh flowers, the country's second biggest foreign exchange earner after tourism, a leading flower producer said on Thursday.
NAIROBI - Cold weather has caused a 20 percent drop in Kenya's production of fresh flowers, the country's second biggest foreign exchange earner after tourism, a leading flower producer said on Thursday.
"We are already down by 60 million roses, all caused by morning mildew disease which has increased our cost of production," said Gerrit Baurnhourn, chief executive officer of Sher Agencies, one of the world's top rose producers.
He told Reuters the company's own farms had lost millions of stems from the falling temperatures.
Trade in Kenyan flowers has grown from humble origins in the early 1970s to account for about $700 million in export earnings last year, overtaking tea to become the nation's second biggest source of hard currency.
The government says the sector, which employs 2 million Kenyans, is vital to creating jobs.
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But Baurnhourn said competition from neighboring Ethiopia and South America would weigh on future earnings.
"Ethiopia is coming up in a big way and it can no longer be ignored," he said in an interview.
