High value floriculture exports

Currently worth less than $10 million annually, the sector takes new plant varieties to the world under patent to protect intellectual property, licenses overseas growers, and collects royalties from flower and bulb sales.

Although the South Island has some high-volume operations, particularly with tulips and Oriental lilies, New Zealand’s climatic and soil conditions do not generally support large bulb-growing ventures. 

Innovation and research

Tauranga-based Bloomz managing director Andy Warren says New Zealand exporters have stayed with the disciplines they are good at – innovation, research and breeding new types of bulbs for export while retaining IP and maintaining royalty streams.

“New Zealanders are very entrepreneurial, always looking for something new and that has been applied to floriculture,” Warren said.

High-tech breeders have created new and exciting high-end quality flowers and shrub varieties for offshore growers to cultivate and sell under the licence-royalty arrangement.

Specialist New Zealand breeders offer new patented flower and ornamental varieties to overseas growers who are licensed to propagate them, mainly for the cut-flower and garden hobbyist markets.

A percentage of revenues generated by the bulbs is remitted to New Zealand for as long as sales continue.

Advantages of the export licensing system include avoiding high freight costs and allowing bulbs to acclimatise and reach flowering stage at their destinations to produce better results.

Plant stock has traditionally been exported to major Northern Hemisphere markets such as the Americas, Europe and Japan and Warren said exports of New Zealand-bred varieties were now going into Kenya, Colombia, Chile and Ecuador and beginning to countries such as China, India and Brazil.

The most popular types include the zantedeschia calla lily family, cordylines ornamental cabbage trees and phormium New Zealand flax.

“And we are developing new varieties for cut flower and pot-plant buyers through high-end niches in our existing markets,” he said.

“We are getting out there with new high-value flowers – commercially viable product - which makes money for the growers.

“NZTE has spent a huge amount of time assisting with commercialisation of our material and opening new markets.

“With NZTE’s assistance we expect good steady growth and in the next three to five years we will see substantial New Zealand influence in those high-end market niches.”