Horticultural production volume has remained low as the peak season for Kenya’s export market kicks off, a situation that has led to major farms fail to meet the growing orders from overseas.
Horticultural production especially flower and vegetable has remained low since April when Covid-19 effects began hitting the country hard, leading to low yields.
Due to the low production, Oserian, Kenya’s largest flower farm, said it could not fully supply its recent orders to their overseas markets.
The director of human resources and administration at the farm said: “We have got an order of 900,000 stems of flowers to supply in The Netherlands, but we can only meet 50 percent of this because of low production.”
In the last eight months, flower production has declined by 20 percent with vegetables declining by 23 percent, highlighting the impact of coronavirus on the sector.
Data from the regulator show that the volumes deepened to 211 million kilograms in the review of the period from 230 million in the corresponding period in 2019.
The horticultural sector has seriously affected after the cancellation of orders in Europe, which say flower farms to reduce production to avoid losses.
The heavy rains that have been witnessed in the country also negatively impacted the production of the crops.
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September marked the start of the peak season for Kenya’s horticulture produce in the European market, which accounts for more than 60 percent of the overall export.
Income from the sector in the first eight months of the year rose to Sh101 billion an increase from Sh97 billion in the same period in 2019, as more countries opened up following the easing of Covid-19 restrictions.
The high for fruits increased the earnings as Europe, Kenya’s major market for fresh produce saw severe countries reopen.
Fruits registered a remarkable growth on income with its value rallying by 50 percent to Sh15 billion from Sh10 billion previously.
