War, freight, flights and the fight of Kenya’s flower farms

For Abraham Kimani, flower farming is no longer just about growing blooms. Increasingly, it is about surviving freight economics. Kimani is the Managing Director of Mount Kenya Sprouts, a 30-hectare flower farm in Kenya’s Nanyuki/Naro Moru region, north of Nairobi, that owns two trucks for logistics. The company specialises in fillers and summer flowers, including limoniums and eryngiums, supplying mainly European markets while also serving customers in the Middle East. Like many growers in Kenya’s floriculture sector, the company depends heavily on air cargo connectivity through Nairobi’s Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA).

But the business environment has become significantly tougher over the past few years, particularly after conflict in the Middle East tightened cargo capacity and pushed up fuel-linked freight costs. “We used to do three deliveries a week. Now we do two, and one is shared with another company because fuel costs in Kenya have gone up so much.”

Cost pressures
For exporters like Kimani, freight has evolved from a cost component into the defining pressure point of the business. “When we started in 2019, freight was only $1.7 per kilo,” he said. “Before the war, freight cost was $3.2 per kilo. Now, we are paying $4, which is a very big increase. Also, anything above the average weekly weight freighted before the war is charged at $5 per kilo,” Kimani added.

According to Nick Matchett, Chief Operating Officer of The Flower Hub, the biggest financial hit has come from freight surcharges, although the operational burden of managing disruptions has been equally demanding for exporters. “The primary cost impact has been on freight, with significant surcharges applied across the board,” he says.

“Beyond cost, the bigger operational challenge has actually been disruption management: when schedules change at short notice, there's a cost to rerouting, reallocating consignments, and keeping customers informed while requesting their flexibility and understanding. That's less visible on a cost line but very real in terms of the time and resources it demands from the team.”

Confirming this, Kenya Flower Council Chief Executive Clement Tulezi said the impact cuts across the industry, regardless of company size. “You can imagine moving from about $3 per kilo to $5 and still climbing. That is a mountain to climb because it’s almost a 60-70 percent increase on freight, yet freight accounts for close to 35-40 percent of all the costs for any grower-exporter.”

The problem, he explained, is compounded by the fact that exporters cannot easily pass on the additional costs to customers because many shipments are tied to long-term supply contracts with fixed pricing structures. “We have exporters who have signed contracts, and these contracts are over a period of time that they will supply these volumes of these kinds of flowers at this rate. So that is not going to fluctuate.”

“Our call is actually to the president. We have escalated this matter to the president because we believe that it has an angle that needs an executive order.”
Clement Tulezi, Kenya Flower Council

Cargo routes
The disruptions are also reshaping trade flows. As instability affects Middle East demand, more flowers that would normally move to Gulf markets are being redirected to Europe, increasing supply pressure there and depressing prices. Matchett also says the Middle East conflict has disrupted both flower shipments and global cargo routing patterns, creating instability across key export markets.

To maintain delivery reliability and flower quality, The Flower Hub has been forced to diversify both routing options and airline partnerships, even though this has added complexity and higher costs to the business. “The conflict has had a direct impact on our business, felt across two dimensions: the knock-on effects on routing and capacity into our core European and Asian markets, and more directly, the disruption to shipments destined for the Middle East itself,” says Matchett.

“We've had to operate via different routing than we'd normally use at this time of year, and we've been working with a broader mix of airlines than pre-war to ensure flowers reach customers in perfect condition and on time,” he says. “That flexibility has been a lifeline for us, but it does come with trade-offs around cost and planning complexity.”

A prime example for this development is Mercy G. Ndumba, Founder and Managing Director of Kiki Flowers, who has carved out a niche business model built around sourcing and consolidating flowers from Kenya’s leading growers and connecting them with florist and wholesale buyers across Turkey, the Middle East and emerging African markets.

Unlike traditional growers, Kiki Flowers does not own farms. Instead, the company acts as a logistics and sourcing coordinator, helping buyers manage procurement, freight coordination, documentation and payments across multiple suppliers. “We are consolidators of flowers,” Ndumba says. “We help clients with sourcing, with coordinating logistics and payments and also consolidation of documents. Our work is basically to help clients have a smooth transition when dealing with various farms in Kenya.”

The business has been built on relationships developed over nearly 15 years in the industry, allowing Kiki Flowers to work with both major farms and selected outgrowers producing niche flower varieties. Ndumba’s customer base is also deliberately specialised. Rather than competing head-on in the highly commoditised European rose market, Kiki Flowers focuses on florists and event-driven buyers seeking premium and unusual flower varieties. “I do unique and big-headed types of flowers, those that just don’t sell for any markets, and they are a bit pricier.”

That niche positioning, however, has also exposed the company to severe air cargo disruptions linked to geopolitical tensions and Middle East airspace closures. While shipments into Turkey remained relatively stable due to uninterrupted Turkish Airlines operations, the Maldives market was hit hard because of its reliance on Gulf hub connections. “Previously, I was using Qatar Airways Cargo only,” Ndumba explains. “When the war started, and Qatar closed the airspace, it was hard for me to coordinate the Maldives shipment. The Maldives was also affected because the product was getting to the market very expensive in terms of freight.”

The higher rates forced customers to sharply reduce shipment frequency. Dubai, another important market for Kenyan flowers, also became difficult as freight rates surged amid reduced connectivity. The volatility has pushed Ndumba and several Kenyan farms to rethink market diversification strategies, particularly towards Africa. “Africa is growing”, she says. “Africans are starting to appreciate the flower culture. My target is to get more African clients.” She points to countries including Nigeria, Ghana, Algeria, Gabon, Togo and Botswana as emerging opportunities for Kenyan flower exporters.

At the same time, she says the disruptions exposed another structural weakness within the industry: overdependence on a narrow group of export markets without the certifications needed to pivot quickly when disruptions occur. “When the Middle East was shut, farms that had the right papers to ship to the UK made killer sales for UK Mother’s Day,” Ndumba says. “Some farms focused 100% on the Middle East, and they did not have the right papers to ship to the UK, so they missed out.”

“When we started in 2019, freight was only $1.7 per kilo. Before the war, it was $3.2 per kilo. Now we are paying $4.”
Abraham Kimani, Mount Kenya Sprouts

Compromises
The rising cost of logistics is also forcing operational compromises even before flowers reach the airport. To reduce transport frequency from the farm to Nairobi, Mount Kenya Sprouts is now holding flowers longer in cold storage. “So that we limit the number of trips to Nairobi,” Kimani said. “It affects the freshness and quality of the flowers, but that is the choice we have now.”

The combined effect of falling flower prices and rising freight rates is forcing growers to rethink crop selection itself. Heavy flower varieties, once commercially viable, are now becoming too expensive to export by air. “Things like statice. Even with some roses, people have to rethink whether to grow them,” he said.

“We used to ship a lot of ammi majus to Europe, but now, because it is a very heavy flower, you have got to stop because the freight cost is too high.” The shift has broader consequences for rural employment and long-term farm planning.

“Maybe you look at increasing others that are lighter and maybe have a better price,” Kimani said. “But it has an effect on the number of jobs that you can offer.” “You have to review your business strategy.”

According to Ndumba, growers and buyers are gradually shifting away from traditional roses towards lighter and higher-yielding summer flowers. “Roses are heavier, and when they get to the market, they don’t fetch a good price,” she says. “Summer flowers can give you a better price than roses.”

Still, Tulezi hopes this remains a temporary survival strategy rather than a structural shift in the industry. “We hope that the current trend of prioritising flowers that are less dense is short-term and does not become a permanent feature of our industry.”

“When schedules change at short notice, there's a cost to rerouting, reallocating consignments, and keeping customers informed while requesting their flexibility and understanding.”
Nick Matchett, The Flower Hub

Competition
Beyond freight volatility and compromises, Matchett warns that prolonged disruption could weaken the competitiveness of Kenyan flower exporters against rivals in Ethiopia and South America if freight costs remain elevated. “First, ensuring there's adequate air cargo capacity out of Kenya at rates that allow us to remain competitive — the Ethiopian and South American flower industries are significant rivals, and when our freight costs are elevated by external shocks, it puts our growers at a disadvantage that has nothing to do with the quality of their product,” he says.

Ndumba of Kiki Flowers believes Kenya’s flower industry is facing mounting competitive pressure from Ethiopia, particularly because of lower logistics costs and stronger government support. “The rates we are paying from Nairobi to Riyadh and the rates they are paying from Ethiopia to Riyadh are two different rates,” she says. “Their flowers are quite cheap, but ours are better.”

According to Ndumba, Ethiopian exporters benefit from lower production costs and more supportive policy frameworks, while Kenyan growers face rising taxes and administrative burdens. “I think the Ethiopian government gives them more support than what we get,” she says. “We get more taxes, more levies and more complicated refund processes.”

She also sees China emerging as another competitive force in certain markets. “Every time I tell clients I cannot get a specific flower, they tell me, ‘Let’s try China,” Ndumba says. Yet despite the growing competition, she insists Kenya retains a quality advantage that continues to matter to buyers. “For example, my Maldives client could still get flowers from China when Kenya shipments were disrupted,” she says. “But once flights resumed, they came back to Kenya, which means Kenya is still their first preference.”

Tulezi of KFC also described China as an emerging competitive threat, especially across Asian and Eastern European markets, where Kenyan flowers traditionally held strong positions. “The quality is improving, not yet at our level, but it is improving. They are quite aggressive in the markets where we thought we had a much bigger hold.”

To counter these pressures, KFC is now pushing for stronger branding, direct connectivity to export markets and regulatory reforms to attract more investment into the sector. “Anyone who wants to bring in extra capacity into Nairobi in terms of freight should be authorised immediately by the government.”

“When the Middle East was shut, farms that had the right papers to ship to the UK made killer sales for UK Mother’s Day, while farms focused 100% on the Middle East missed out.”
Mercy G. Ndumba, Kiki Flowers

Call to Kenyan government
Kimani of Mount Kenya Sprouts believes stronger intervention is needed from the Kenyan government, particularly through aviation policy and cargo capacity support. “Kenya Airways should invest in cargo planes and try to help us, like what happens in Ethiopia. In Ethiopia, they are still paying maybe about $2 to the same destination, but we are paying $4.”

Meanwhile, Tulezi informed that the industry has already escalated the current logistics crisis to the highest level of government, seeking direct intervention from the Kenyan presidency. “Our call is actually to the president. We have escalated this matter to the president because we believe that it has an angle that needs an executive order.”

According to Tulezi, the industry is seeking immediate relief measures, particularly the release of delayed VAT refunds owed to flower exporters, which he says could provide crucial liquidity for growers struggling under mounting operational pressure. “The government owes us more than 10 billion Kenyan shillings, and if this started flowing, then it can keep the growers afloat in terms of putting cash into their pockets for running the business, paying workers and at least in the meantime, as we look for other options, we can start with that.”

Matchett of The Flower Hub adds that protecting growers through the current crisis is critical for the long-term sustainability of the industry. “More fundamentally, we need to see real support being shown to our grower base during this period,” he says. “Growers are the backbone of this industry, and many are under genuine pressure right now. When the war ends, we need those farms to still be there, operating and exporting. Ensuring they can weather this period intact should be a priority — for the government, for industry bodies, and frankly for all of us in the supply chain.”

Despite the turbulence, Kenya’s flower industry remains determined to protect its global reputation for quality and reliability. But growers, exporters and logistics operators agree that survival will depend on faster policy support, improved cargo capacity and greater market diversification. For many in the industry, the immediate challenge is no longer expansion or growth, but simply staying competitive long enough to weather a period where geopolitics, freight economics and supply chain instability have become as important as the flowers themselves.

The article was originally published in the May-June 2026 issue of Logistics Update Africa.