FLORICULTURE NEWS
Kisima Flowers Sustainability Interview
HortiNews TV interview with Kisima Flowers.
Kisima farm has been recognized at the Kenya Flower Council Pinnacle Awards for sustainability and community support. General Manager Craig Oulton takes us through the farm's sustainability programmes. From converting plants waste into organic fertilizer, recycling greenhouse materials into troughs, meticulous collection and storage of water, re-ingeering greenhouses for pests control, going back to nature by growing in soil, undercover farming and much, much more.
October update
A beautiful photo of our new rose variety, ‘Silantoi’, in a vase at Ngare Ndare. Our new variety of Delphinium ‘Candle Series’ has also been launched and is looking great!
Floriculture Pinnacle Awards
The Kenya Flower Council (KFC), in collaboration with Absa Bank Kenya and Royal FloraHolland hosted the first-ever Floriculture Pinnacle Awards on September 12, 2024, at Lake Naivasha Resort. This event brought together top industry leaders to celebrate outstanding achievements in sustainability and innovation within Kenya’s floriculture sector.
The awards, designed to promote best practices that minimize environmental impact, were divided into three main categories; Environmental Impact, Social Impact, and Good Agricultural Practices, with a focus on inclusivity across farm sizes.
The Best Community Partnership Program award went to Mount Elgon Orchards Ltd and Kisima Farm Limited for their initiatives in supporting local communities, while Sosiani and Kisima Farm Limited also took home the Best Organic Waste Management award for their innovative waste recycling practices.
Gold Standard
We are Gold! Kisima Flowers have acheived Gold Standard for another year - the Kenya Flower Council's highest accreditation. A huge amount of work goes towards setting our standards at the highest level in Environmental and Social sustainability.......and all of us our very proud!
March News
Greenhouse 16 will be completed by the end of April and we hope to plant two new varieties in May - Revival and Silantoi. The Craspedia yellow paintball has proved very popular on the market during Easter, Women’s Day and Mother's Day.
The Delphinium production under shade net has really improved the quality and production of the crop. New kittens have been born in Floriculture which is exciting as it will help with the rat and mice population in the canteen and stores.
Craspedia Expansion
Craspedia has proven to be very popular and we are planning to expand into another hectare later this year in anticipation of Mothers Day and Easter 2024.
IFTEX show
Kisima Floriculture attended the IFTEX show in Nairobi on the 6th - 8th June. IFTEX is the Kenya Flower Industry Expo and the quality of the Kisima flowers was very impressive.
Hydroponic Veggie Gardens
Floriculture have been revamping the planting for their kitchen. Carrots and Sukuma are being grown in horizontal hydroponic grow bags.
Sea freight for flowers
Kisima Floriculture has continued to use sea freight for flowers over the past year. We plan to double the export using sea freight as calculations show sea freight uses 80% less carbon than air freight. The flowers are harvested into a solution and then dipped into an Ethylene gas suppressor before being packed in polythene packets.
Audits and Accreditations
Kisima Floriculture has been certified to the Gold accreditation standard for the second year by the Kenya Flower Council. A fantastic achievement as one of only three famr sot have acheived this standard.
The European MPS-SQ audit was completed and this audit focuses on health and safety, and good working conditions. With the MPS-Socially Qualified (SQ) certificate, you demonstrate that your company meets the national and international requirements in the field of health and safety. Floriclture continues on the path to social and environmental sustainability excellence.
'Worm Juice'
Kisima Floriculture has established wormeries and has created ‘worm juice’ to supplement the need for fertilizers for our plants. The worm juice works as a natural fertilizer. The defoliated leaves and rose waste are used as the ‘food.’ The worms then eat and digest the broken down waste and produce the juice material. This is the purest form of organic fertilizer and is used every week alongside the traditional fertilizers.
Waiting for the rains!
We are desperately waiting for the rains! Any and every way of getting water into our lagoons which includes designing our own guttering from every roof.
New packing shed
The new summer flowers packing shed and cold store is under construction and will be completed by the end of September.
Expansion, expansion, expansion!
The trial house is in full bloom and all the trials are now being evaluated for 2023 and beyond. The new Craspedia expansion is underway to capture the European summer market. The new rose expansion is fully planted and we are now harvesting.
A 2ha expansion is underway at Floriculture and we have invested in state of the art metal greenhouses.
The Haygrove Tunnels are being constructed and the structures are going up this month for the new Matthiola project.
Sea Freight for Flowers
In early December our first sea freight container left for Europe packed with flowers. The container will arrive in the first week of January and it will be very interesting to see how this trial goes with regards to reducing our air freight carbon emissions for floriculture.
HortFresh Journal article on 20 years of Kisima Flowers!
Please see the article on 20 years of Kisima Floriculture here.
October updates
The first commercial Alstroemeria was planted with three new varieties which will be available on the market in 2022. By the end of November we will have completed our indoor Delphinium project. We have taken 1.5ha of hydroponic roses out in preparation for the new indoor Delphiniums.
