The importance of locally-grown, seasonal and chemical-free in flower farming

Why do buzz words like locally-grown, seasonal and chemical-free actually matter?

You may regularly read these words from sustainable flower farmers or other sustainably minded businesses, but is it clear why they are important?

The importance of LOCALLY GROWN

Anything you can buy that is locally grown is better for the environment due to the reduced distance the product has travelled from producer to consumer.

So many products we buy have travelled literally thousands of miles. In order to travel that distance, fossil fuels will have been burnt in the form of petrol/diesel to power planes, ships & lorries. Flowers often arrive into the UK having come from Africa or South America, via the Netherlands. They have travelled a long way and burnt a lot of fossil fuels, polluting the atmosphere with the emissions and adding to the greenhouse effect – the primary cause of climate change. Powering refrigerators during transport to keep flowers cool also requires the combustion of fossil fuels. Considering the flowers will probably die a week or so later, this seems like an unjustifiably high carbon footprint to incur.

The importance of SEASONAL

Growing in line with the seasons means the natural conditions outdoors are suitable for growing that particular product at that particular time. It means the product most likely won’t have required artificial heating or lighting to make it grow. Growing flowers out of season means they are most likely grown indoors in a heated glasshouse, with artificial lighting. How is heat and light generated? You got it, often by burning fossil fuels.

This will not always the case as renewable energy sources could be used, but growing without any energy requirement is obviously better for the environment.

The importance of CHEMICAL-FREE

Using chemicals such as fertilizers, pesticides, herbicides, fungicides and insecticides has an impact beyond the target of the application. Spraying a flower with a pesticide to kill one particular pest doesn’t mean that that is the end of the story. Some of the chemical will hit the target and do its intended job, but a lot of it will leak off, finding its way into the soil, into the waterways and then who knows where, killing many more species than the intended target pest. Residues of that chemical will also remain on the flower, a flower which is then handled by multiple people. Is that chemical ending up inside us, and if so, is that having an affect? It’s not clear! The easiest solution is to avoid chemical use altogether.

To conclude

If we consider an average supermarket bunch of flowers, it is likely the flowers are imported and will have travelled a considerable distance from grower to consumer. It is likely they will have been sprayed by a concoction of chemicals, and dependent on where they were grown, they may or may not be seasonal.

In a world where we need to be reducing greenhouse gas emissions, choosing locally grown, seasonal flowers is one simple swap that can be implemented relatively easily. It may be less convenient than the supermarket, but convenience can’t rule forever.