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Flowers, fruits and vegetables export increases Kenya’s earnings by Sh89bn

Export of horticulture crops such as flowers, fruits and vegetables among others has earned Kenya Sh305bn in 2017 as compared to Sh216bn in the previous year translating to Sh89bn increase as spurred by compliance with the export market requirements by majority of exporters especially to the European Union (EU).

In overal, the sales of horticultural produce exported in 2017 was Sh115bn, which is an increase as compared to Sh101.5bn in 2016, according to statistics by the Fresh Produce Consortium of Kenya (FPC Kenya).

There was an increase of 16 per cent, 14 per cent and 2.9 per cent in the total metric tonnes of flowers, fruits and vegetables respectively which were exported in 2017 representing over 41 per cent production by farmers.

“Domestic cut flowers, fruits and vegetables production value has been growing over the years as reflected by the figures,” said Okesegere Ojepat, chief executive officer of Fresh Produce Consortium (FPC) of Kenya.

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According to the statistics, cut flowers still remains the largest earner, contributing over 70 per cent of the total fresh produce annual earnings.

Flower exports contributed Sh82.24 billion, up from Sh70.83 billion earned in 2016, representing 11.6 per cent growth, on export volume of 159,961 tonnes.

Fruits and vegetables earned Sh9 billion and Sh24 billion, on export volumes of 56,945 tonnes and 87,240 tonnes respectively in 2017.

Ojepat was speaking at the official launch of FPC Kenya, which rebranded from Kenya Association of Fruits to Vegetable Exporters.

“The rebranding begins to widen our mandate to cover even more areas especially domestic market, we have never coordinated well and which offers us capacity to engage with more players, and enabling us to extend our membership and grow the sector,” he said.

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Horticultural Crops Directorate (HCD) stats

On the other hand, Kenya’s HCD statistics on horticultural crops export between January – September 2017 and 2016 indicates that there was an increase in metric tonnes of the crops exported by over 32 per cent.

A total of 159,961 and 133,658 metric tonnes of cut-flowers valued at Sh82,249m and Sh70,829m were exported in January – December 2017 and 2016 respectively, this represent an increment of 20 percent and 16 percent in volume and value respectively.

Another total of 56,945 and 48,658 metric tonnes of fruits valued at Sh9,009m and Sh7,652m were exported between January and December 2017 and 2016 respectively.

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A total of 87,240 metric tonnes of vegetables valued at Sh24,065m were exported in 2017 compared to 78,790 metric tonnes valued at Sh23,367m the previous year. This represents an increase of 11 percent in the quantities sold and 3 per cent in value.

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