Alejandro Martínez

EXECUTIVE PRESIDENT, THE ASSOCIATION OF PRODUCERS AND EXPORTERS OF FLOWERS (EXPOFLORES)

How does Expoflores operate in terms of its business model?

Expoflores is a non-profit trade association founded about 36 years ago. Here, we have the complete cluster because we have the breeders, growers, freight forwarders, airliners, suppliers, and strategic partners that work within the sector. We have 265 members here, and most of them are growers. In terms of the cluster, we gather 90% of the breeders, 72% of the productive hectares, about 80% of freight forwarders, and about 15-20% of the suppliers. Given that flowers are mainly an export product; we export 99.3% of our production. We focus heavily on global consumption trends, value chains, and political trends because all these affect us either positively or negatively in terms of consumption. We also keep logistics in mind because it is dynamic by nature. We gather ideas from different growers and try to implement those in the real world. Finally, we strive to maintain fluid communication with our three main clients: our internal clients, namely our members; our external clients, which is the market; and government/society, because they know what is going on in the sector.

What is your vision for Expoflores?

The expectations of the growers and other members of Expoflores will increase. Right after Valentine’s Day, we released our five-year long, big data initiative. One will be able to see the pricing today per stem, per length of stem, per variety to any part of the world, the freight on it, what is going on with that specific variety on that specific land, and much more information. All that data plus the data from whatever we do locally here will go to US and European customs, so that the import timing will be an hour and a half instead of being six hours on average. Then, we will release a tracking system for consumer who can track a specific stem all the way to the crop, how it got there, how the farm is doing carbon neutral, go live and see the farm where you actually bought the flowers from, and how the workers there are doing. That is our next goal, and the expectations will be high.