On Monday 17 March, the first reefer container of flowers railed from Naivasha to the port of Mombasa in Kenya. The Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) is meant to be a more sustainable and cheaper alternative to trucking for the transport of fresh products to the Kenyan port.
The first Kenyan railroad transport took place as King Willem-Alexander and Queen Maxima of the Netherlands were on a state visit in Kenya. It was a collaboration between Nini Flowers, Dutch Flower Group, Maersk, Kenyan Railway Cooperation and Kenya Ports Authority, among other parties. The trial was supported by Invest International, Flying Swans and the Dutch Embassy in Kenya and was part of the Memorandum of Understanding between the Netherlands and Kenya regarding agro logistics.
The train carrying the first reefer container of roses from Nini Flowers left the Inland Container Depot (ICD) in Naivasha to arrive in Mombasa on the same day after a 572-kilometer journey on the Standard Gauge Railway. According to Dutch Flower Group (DFG), the journey took fourteen hours. The exporting company refers to the trial shipment as a milestone in the development of the Kenyan Cool Logistics Corridor. The sea container, which contained 400,000 roses, was kept cool on the track and in the port thanks to a clip-on gen set and a small diesel generator.
