Production

The climate in Ziway is very suitable for growing roses with good temperatures and a lot of sunshine, so heating and assimilation light is not necessary. Opposite of many other rose-growing areas in East Africa, the rainy season is very short and soft. Because of this we have less problems with Botrytis. We are able to offer a product with a constant quality in constant quantities year-round. Because of the very high light intensities, the driving force of photosynthesis of plants, we are able to grow roses with an excellent quality and sparkling colours.

After propagation of the varieties selected by us, the young plants were planted in the soil on raised beds. After 2.5 months the first flowers could be harvested. The plants are irrigated with driplines. Integrated crop protection is used to protect the plants from pests and diseases.

Harvesting

The roses are harvested with great care 5 times a day to ensure a very uniform opening stage of the flowers. The harvested flowers are directly put in water with pre-treatment solution and are transported directly to the cold store to prevent from ripening.

Grading

The flowers are graded in the grading hall on length and opening stage. During grading also roses with bent stems, with damaged flowers, infected by diseases will be graded out. Only A1 quality flowers are transported to The Netherlands.

Transport

After storage in the cold store the roses are packed with great care in boxes. Early in the morning the boxes are transported by cooled truck to the airport of Addis Ababa, where they will be loaded on airfreight plates. The flowers are transported to The Netherlands by plane. After clearing of the flowers they are transported by cooled truck to our location at Flora Holland Aalsmeer. Arrived in Aalsmeer, the boxes are offloaded as quickly as possible and placed in the coldstore. With help of data loggers temperature and humidity are controlled to minimize quality losses during transport.