Fujian's flower industry grows for 7 consecutive years, specialty flowers become the mainstay

    Yesterday, a reporter learned from the Fujian Provincial Flower Association that despite the adverse effects of the financial crisis, the total sales of Fujian's flower industry still maintained steady growth for 7 consecutive years.                         

According to a survey by the Provincial Forestry Department and the Provincial Flower Association, in 2008 the province's total flower planting area was 19,300 hectares, total sales were 4.331 billion yuan, total exports were 39.127 million USD, and total imports were 5.353 million USD, up 5.9%, 8.6%, 23.0% and 210.7% respectively over the previous year. The province's total flower sales and annual sales per mu both showed a steady year-by-year upward trend for 7 consecutive years.
    
The crisis caused three major impacts

However, despite generally good development, some enterprises withdrew from the flower industry due to the impact of the financial crisis. In 2008, the province had a total of 52 flower markets, 3 fewer than the previous year; 1,566 flower enterprises, 16 fewer than the previous year; and a total of 27,875 specialized flower households, 148 fewer than the previous year.

President Chai of the Fujian Provincial Flower Association told reporters that the association had conducted a special study on the impact of the international financial crisis on Fujian's flower industry, and the results showed that the financial crisis caused a certain impact on Fujian's flower industry, mainly in the following ways: first, group flower purchases decreased, mainly because some enterprises reduced this expenditure due to the economic downturn; second, purchases of flowers and nursery stock for projects decreased, mainly because the real estate industry and others, affected by insufficient funds, reduced greening expenses; third, orders for flowers exported to Europe, the United States, Japan and other places dropped sharply, or were affected by the depreciation of local currencies, resulting in no profit from exports.

Specialty flowers become the "mainstay"

The reporter learned that the reason Fujian's flower industry was able to rise against the trend during the financial crisis was that Fujian-produced specialty flowers played a major driving role. For example, the planting area of Fuzhou Norfolk Island pine bonsai has reached more than 6,000 mu, with output close to 2 million pots, and last year's output value reached 40 to 50 million yuan; Nanjing orchids are of superior quality and very popular on the market, with sales of about 100 million yuan the year before last, and last year orders from northern regions in China increased greatly, causing sales to grow substantially; Zhangzhou narcissus has a quality advantage, producing more than 30 million narcissus bulbs last year, with sales reaching 100 million yuan, some of which were sold by mail after artistic carving, with prices nearly 10 times higher, and total output value close to 400 million yuan.

    Give play to the advantages of the West Coast Economic Zone and avoid weaknesses

However, some experts also pointed out that there are still some problems in the development of Fujian's flower industry: first, there are not yet many large-scale flower enterprises. Compared with the whole country, Fujian's flower industry started earlier and has a larger number, but most are small family-style or cooperative enterprises with little investment, low output and low quality, making it difficult to form a competitive advantage; second, investment in technological innovation is limited. The flower industry is a high-investment, high-output, high-risk industry, and new varieties and new technologies are the core competitiveness of the flower industry, but many flower enterprises invest only limited amounts in this, which affects industrial development to a certain extent; third, awareness of brand and variety protection is insufficient. According to statistics, Fujian has a total of 3,000 to 4,000 cultivated flower resources. However, the varieties commonly seen on the market today, such as carnations, roses, lilies and chrysanthemums, are almost all introduced from abroad, and once exported, variety usage fees must be paid, and these fees account for at least 25% of output value. In fact, Fujian has all of these varieties, but no one has developed them, or after development they were not valued for protection, leading to the current passive situation.

President Chai also pointed out that Fujian has a long history of growing and cultivating flowers, rich flower resources, a uniquely favorable climate, and abundant labor advantages in the flower industry. For example, in 2008 the province had 116,900 flower industry employees, including 7,163 flower professional and technical personnel, which played an extremely key role in the development of Fujian's flower industry. If flower enterprises can improve labor productivity, use mature scientific production processes, and establish their own brands, they will drive the rapid development of the province's flower industry.

It was also introduced that the establishment of the West Coast Economic Zone will bring huge opportunities for the development of Fujian's flower industry. For example, by using the "five ties" advantage between Fujian and Taiwan to establish an agricultural science and technology research and development and promotion platform in line with international standards, strengthening agricultural science and technology cooperation with Taiwan, breaking through technical barriers in international flower trade, comprehensively raising the level of Fujian's flower industry, reducing planting costs, driving increased production and income for flower farmers across the province, and accelerating industrial upgrading.