Supporting Kenya's cut flower sector adapt to climate change: The country's floriculture sector is increasingly feeling the impact of climate change and realizing the urgent need to adapt to stay competitive.

• Author: Clement, Delphine
• Position: PHOTO SPECIAL

The cut flower sector is one of Kenya's main exports and one of the largest employers in the country. Highly sensitive to changing weather patterns, the industry is increasingly feeling the impacts of climate change. In recent years, many flower farms have had to cope with a range of threats: heavy rainfalls, prolonged cold weather and too high temperatures in the greenhouses. As a result, scheduling the cutting ahead of key sales periods such as Valentine's Day or Christmas is becoming challenging.

The International Trade Centre's (ITC) Trade for Sustainable Development programme began work in 2018 to support the competitiveness of micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) in Kenya's floriculture sector as well as the tea and coffee sectors, looking to build climate resilience across international value chains. The overall objective was to provide support to MSMEs to integrate climate-change considerations into their business risk analysis and to create climate adaptation strategies that include practical and bankable measures. Financed by the German Federal Mnistry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), the project has also carried out interventions in the textile and agro-processing sectors in Morocco.

Kenyan floriculture companies participated in a six-month customized coaching programme that helped them identify numerous adaptation measures. These included the selection of new flower...