The Cut Flower Trade  -  USA  and International Perspective

The international trade of cut flowers is a blooming industry, with an average annual growth of 6 percent and an estimated global trade volume of more than $100 billion a year. In the U.S. alone, more than $13 billion worth of cut flowers are sold annually, and the majority — a whopping 82 percent — are imported.

In a similar manner to the evolution of supply of fresh produce, the flower industry has transitioned from a traditional model based on local production to an international one that leverages warmer climates and significantly lower labour costs in developing countries.

Even the industry's queen, the Netherlands, has largely shifted its focus from production to trade. Instead of growing all those tulips themselves, the Dutch now host the global hub for 60 percent of the world's dealings in cut flowers.

The Netherlands is also one of the biggest flower consumers, alongside the U.S., Germany, France, the U.K., Switzerland and Japan (the first five buy around three-quarters of the world's cut flowers).

So where do the world’s commercial flowers grow? The U.S. imports mainly from Colombia, a nation that sells around 500 million tons of flowers for Valentine's Day. Americans get 78 percent of their imported flowers from Colombia, followed by Ecuador and Mexico at 15 percent and 2 percent respectively. Europe, on the other hand, imports most of its flowers from Africa, with Kenya in the lead, followed by Ethiopia, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Uganda, Tanzania and Zambia.

In New Zealand we have been relatively immune from these trends until recently, where an increasingly significant number of cut flowers are now coming in from India, Colombia and Malaysia.

Material originates from: Hortbiz.com and the PMAC Newsletter