Lufthansa Cargo supplies Europe with 900 tonnes of roses
Lovers like to express their affection with flowers on February 14th. Roses have been a symbol of love and beauty since ancient times. To serve the especially high import demand around Valentine’s Day, Lufthansa Cargo transports 900 tonnes of the long-stemmed flowers on the Quito – Frankfurt, Bogotá – Frankfurt and Nairobi – Frankfurt routes this year – equivalent to some 10 million individual roses.
Most of the roses begin their journey in Bolivia, Ecuador or Kenya. These countries have the ideal climate for cultivating these flowers and the best growing conditions all year round. To ensure these floral tokens of love reach their recipients in full bloom, they must be transported quickly and carefully at a constant temperature of two to four degrees Celsius along the entire logistics chain.
The roses are harvested several times a day at the flower farms in Africa and South America and then immediately placed in water and cooled. Following sorting and packing, the flowers are taken directly to the airport and loaded onto the freighters.
The flowers only remain in Frankfurt Airport for a short while. Just a few hours after landing, the roses are transported onwards from this city on the Main river out into all of Europe – primarily to other German cities, but also to neighboring countries, including Austria and Switzerland.