Chakravarthi : The Grower.
With profound gratitude and humility, Chakravarthi accepted the call to work in a flower farm. Little did he know that the call will take him far from his hometown. Through hard work and sacrifice he has risen from a project manager in India to one of the most succesful flower farm managers in Kenya. He tells his story.

Briefly discuss Chakravarthi (background-personal and as a grower to current position country General Manager Panda Flowers Ltd)
I have done bachelor of science and masters of science in agriculture from Asia’s number one renowned Institute, best for agriculture research and development, Tamil nadu Agricultural university (TNAU) Coimbatore. After my education, I joined Bio dynamic agriculture as a project manager which involves organic farming and mushroom cultivation and training the farmers in to EID parry group. Accidently I was approached by one of the flower farm managers, Mr. Srinivasan, MD for Floritech India Ltd, Bengalore.

I must thank him for this opened my doors to this position. My main job at Floritech was to convert their rose waste into manure and using organic system into their rose project. I was doing some manuring and vermicomposting, other than been involved in the actual rose production. After sometime the existing Farm Manger left the job and I took over the farm manager position of the 3.5 ha rose project in 2002. That is how I started my carrier in floriculture industry. In 2006 I got the opportunity to work in Kenya as a production manager at Black tulip flowers group through Mr. Ehiya, MD. Thereafter I moved to Uganda (Mehta group) for 4 years as a farm manger and rode to Snr farm manager. In 2011 I moved back to Kenya and joined Panda flowers Ltd as a general manager, the position I’m holding to date.

How do you see the future for African rose growers?
What should they focus on to survive?
In the future growers should concentrate more on consistent quality with increased productivity per square meter, while using minimum input. They also need to put more attention on right variety selection process, grow the crop for at least 5 years and sustain it in the market.

You have been growing and selling flowers for most of your professional life, if you would have to give your remarks about been a grower, what would they be?
Based on my knowledge growers are maximizing more returns per square meter on intermediate/ medium size roses than in case of big headed roses. Thereby growers face fewer challenges in the medium altitude region to produce and market the flowers.

Any challenges you have faced as a grower?
I have been into different ecological zones like India , Uganda and Kenya with different altitudes (1260 to 2300), Each region has its own merits and demerits on various ecological factors, I faced big challenges on plastic management in Uganda because of frequent storm that damaged the plastic and structure. Same time, I experienced high risk of mites management because of high humidity and warm weather condition. I used to have very rare occasion of botrytis incidents in Uganda. In Kenya we don’t experience such a huge problem, here we have different challenges especially on Thrips and Downey mildew management which are more serious and persistent problems.

What would you point out as your strongest attribute that has made you succeed as a grower?
I strongly believe that as a grower I need to focus much attention on growing media management which provides optimum growing conditions for better crop growth in both soil and hydroponic system, and a proper follow up on Fertigation to the crops on day to day basis based on crop growth requirement and weather conditions. In addition teamwork, better human resource management approach on work force, crop protection and crop table management are the other vital factors to succeed in growing.

In your experiences, briefly discuss production, the vase life and transportability and marketing of flowers in Kenya?
Kenya, especially Naivasha is blessed with the best weather for rose production, however more needs to be done to ensure better vase life. Also in terms for packaging we need to learn from countries like Ecuador to improve.

In your experience discuss the minimum/maximum head size in cm and stem length in cm you expect from most rose varieties in different growing areas in Kenya? Does this mean anything when a grower is selecting a variety?
Based on the altitude both stem length and bud size are significantly different. In my experience I have seen a minimum of 3.4 – 3.6 cms and maximum of 5.4 – 5.8 cms in our farm. Yes this is also a major factor for selecting a variety.

Concerning marketing, discuss both direct and auction markets. For the last one-year we have seen a more aggressive marketing by flower farms with increments of direct sales compared to the auctions, what can you attribute this to?
Yes, this is a growing trend for many growers mainly attributed to the reduced returns from the auction market and inconsistent prices in the auction which also involves more overhead costs like auction commission and handling costs. Variety selection is also a vital challenge for the auction, and most growers don’t succeed always. Most times the auction prices of the selected varieties start declining after some time hence diminishing returns. The growers keep looking for new varieties which come with a high cost in terms of loyalties and planting costs. Auction seems more like a gambling casino nowadays.

What is your opinion: Sell farm made bouquets or sell to bouquet makers?
Farm made Bouquets are the new kind of emerging market trend due to increasing labour cost in western countries, most buyers prefer to have farm made bouquets instead of flowers. Our farm gets better returns for readymade bouquets so we concentrate more on those lines.

How would you describe your time as the General Manager, Panda Flowers?
Are you passionate about what you do?
In the beginning when I joined this farm I had a very big challenge and tough time especially on production. Now I have overcome all those problems and I am having a wonderful time at Panda Flowers, I feel like I am still learning and am very passionate about my work.

What is your vision for Panda Flowers? What are your top priorities?
As of now we are mainly growing in Soil, but in the future we are planning to convert the whole farm into hydroponics to overcome soil and water related problems and effective management of nematodes. Our top priority as of now is to harvest rainwater, and we are building a huge reservoir with a capacity of about 100,000 cubic meters. So I’m targeting to touch 100 million stems export yearly. This is very possible over here after this new project...and also focusing to find new markets in Russia and Dubai, which is emerging trend of our flower market line.

Briefly discuss the Panda Flowers team?
Panda flowers has a very good self motivated team along with me and supporting the Panda vision. We all work as panda family and support the company to maintain the quality and quantity of the production. This team comprises of various cadres involving top management, middle level management, senior supervisors, supervisors and the junior workers. A team whose vision is to ensure consistency in its operations, quality production of flowers that would maintain trust among our customers and utmost care to the staff welfare.

What’s the biggest challenge YOU feel your company faces, and how do you inspire your employees to meet it head on?
The company currently is faced with the pressure to supply quality flowers owing to the growing need to customer demands. The need to have a constituent supply of skilled labour to be able to tackle the challenges that comes with the need to be innovative. Another challenge is having to train workers every now and then due to the fact that those available to work in this industry are semi illiterate hence inability to grasp growing concepts. The company has made efforts to reduce staff turnover so as to reduce the number of those leaving the farm and hence retain the existing and experienced workforce. The company through fair-trade premiums has made significant changes in the life of the workers resulting to reduced turnover and thus maintaining skills for a longer period. Some of the projects that the company has include;
• Bursary for the workers dependants in secondary schools
• Water purifying plant which provides them with constant supply of drinking water
• Dairy project providing milk to workers at a very low cost
• Poultry project that sells eggs to workers at a lower price compared to the market price
• Posho mill project that provides maize flower on credit to workers
• Wellness program that takes care of health programmes for workers such as vaccinations for various diseases – Hepatitis B, Cervical Cancer, Typhoid vaccines etc
• Housing project that helped in purchasing land for workers then subdivided hence more than 300 workers have their own homes.
• The company also contributed in setting up of a 80 bed capacity project for women’s hospital within Naivasha regions. This is a project which has been funded by other fair-trade flower farms and the German DEG bank. The hospital is already operational. This is a brain child of Panda flowers.

What advice do you have for growers to prepare for the changing trends?
Kenya is the world leader of cut flower production and export and also on plantation and sharing a big percentage of fresh vegetables export in to the Europe, As growers we are suffering from the continuous increasing trends of 10-15 % input cost on all imported fertilizers and chemicals which is really making business sustainance tough. I feel that the Government should to come forward and save the world’s largest horticulture industry and sustain the business. They need to encourage potential investors to set up a fertilizer manufacturing factory in the country. This will have a wide scope and will uplift all Kenyan commercial growers and farmers and also benefit other East African and Central African growers by reducing 30-40 % of their direct fertilizer cost. This should happen in the near future. Otherwise the sector is following modernized technology to maximize returns while also maintaining some corporate social responsibility.

What is your personal work ethic, and how does this affect the company culture?
Seeing is believing so I don’t rely on reports, I need to verify physically by going to the field. I always ensure that my ideas and thoughts are implemented well. I feel that this system of operation is working better since team members can understand the importance of supervision and follow up. Because floriculture is more labour oriented in nature and we mostly deal with unskilled work force mistakes are very common because some don’t understand the technical importance of the agronomic practices. Continuous guiding and counseling is the prime factor to manage the job well.

What decisions have you made in your career that you look back on feel where mistakes?
Am not an expert on all aspects, so I may not say it is a mistake, it is a way for trying new ideas, therefore am still learning by experimenting.

Describe your ordinary day? Do you still have enough personal time?
My day beings with a brief review of previous day’s production report, rejection report and sales report followed by brief meeting with the pack house and the production team to plan the day’s work, and target. Then at least 10 hectares crop walk along with my supervisors daily. There after I meet the scouts and spray teams in the afternoon to understand the ground realities and new developments of pests and diseases in the green house. We thereafter plan spray programs for the following days. Obviously it is stressful life in floriculture since we are fighting more time with unknown enemies (nature) throughout the period. Definitely I need to find time to relax and I do have enough time to spend with my family after the work.

Give your final comments.
Thank you for giving me this opportunity to share my views.