Valentine's Day: Love doubles rose prices; flowers imported for first time

Prices double as wedding season overlaps with Valentine's Day

If you have waited till Valentine’s Day to buy your beloved a rose — instead of doing that a week back on Rose Day (February 7) — you might have to pay double for the flower. In Mumbai or New Delhi, each rose is selling for Rs 20-22 ahead of February 14.

This translates into a realisation of Rs 15 a stem for farmers. Even a week back, it was about Rs 7-9 a stem.

Sources in the flower industry said Valentine’s Day is celebrated now not only by young couples but people of all ages. Buying your partner a flower or a bouquet on February 14 is a hot trend. As a result, flower farmers are laughing all the way to the bank with seasonal profits, even at a time when the farm sector is struggling to realise production costs.

“Remuneration in the domestic market has been very high. The prices in India are better than in London,” said Ramakrishna Karuturi, managing director, Karuturi Global. His company is one the largest exporters of rose stems in the country, with estates in Ethiopia.

In London or other European markets, the retail price is $0.4 (about Rs 28 a stem). With high cost of air freight, handling and transport, actual realisation for farmers is less than Rs 10 a stem.

Karuturi said, “This is the best Valentine’s Day for Indian rose growers in the past 25 year. Rose prices have been strong for six month, making business more profitable than expected.”

This year, demand has been so good that for the first time India has imported 10-15 shipments of roses from South America and Africa. The price of these imported roses is far less than their Indian cousins.

The price of each imported rose is Rs 5-5.50. With an import duty of 60 per cent, the price increases to about Rs 8-10. Sources in the industry said if demand increases, there might be imports from Thailand as well.

What has prompted this is the overlap of the Valentine season with the long wedding season. Average income from floriculture has increased from Rs 5-6 lakh to Rs 10 lakh per acreage this year.

“People gift roses during Valentine’s Day. It is also used for decorations during weddings,” said Narendra Patil, vice-president, Soex Flora, a Pune-based rose grower and exporter. “Overlap of these has created bumper demand this year.”

While the domestic market, estimated to be as big as Rs 13,000 crore in 2017, has been strong, export realisation has fallen a bit.

Data compiled by the Agricultural and Processed Food Export Development Authority (Apeda) showed a decline in average realisation from floriculture exports at $3,626 a tonne for the first nine months of the current financial year (2018-19 or FY19) ended December 2018. In the same period last year, it was $3,724 a tonne.

For 2017-18 financial year however, average realisation was $3,804 a tonne.

India’s floriculture volume export jumped 7.5 per cent to 16,630 tonnes between April and December last year. In the same period of 2017, it was 15,478 tonnes.

The floriculture market is expected to grow about 20 per cent in FY19. By 2023, it is expected to be Rs 39,400 crore, with an average growth of 20 per cent. Roses contribute nearly half of this.