The Cut Flower Podcast

Sustainable Floristry: Navigating the Global Flower Industry with Dr. David Bek

• Roz Chandler / David Bek • Season 1 • Episode 102

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Text Agony Aunt Roz with your Cutflower Questions.

Hi, I’m Roz Chandler, and welcome back to The Cutflower Podcast! Today, I'm thrilled to welcome back Dr. David Bek, a leading researcher in sustainable horticulture and creative economics at Coventry University. A lot has changed since David's last visit, and we're diving into his latest work on sustainable practices in the cut flower industry, including insights on the global supply chain, eco-friendly packaging, and the challenges we face in the push for sustainable floristry.

Episode Summary:

In this episode, Roz Chandler sits down again with Dr. David Bek to explore the complex world of sustainable cut flowers and the economics behind them. David shares his journey from childhood experiences with nature to becoming a prominent researcher in sustainable horticulture, with a particular focus on flowers. They discuss his work with the Sustainable Cut Flowers Project and the intricate supply chains that transport flowers across continents.

David highlights the environmental challenges of the cut flower industry, from high carbon footprints to issues with plastic packaging, and how he and other experts are working to find solutions. The conversation touches on sustainable floristry practices, labeling transparency, and efforts to reduce plastic waste. David also shares stories about the impact of economic drivers on sustainability, including how consumer demand shapes market practices. Together, Roz and David discuss the future of sustainable floristry, emphasizing the importance of collaboration among growers, florists, and consumers.

Key Takeaways:

  1. Understanding the Environmental Cost: The global journey of flowers involves significant carbon emissions, packaging, and preservation efforts that impact sustainability.
  2. The Role of Consumer Demand: Change in the industry often comes down to consumer awareness and demand for sustainably grown, local flowers.
  3. Importance of Transparency and Labeling: Clear labeling can inform consumers about flower origins and sustainability practices, helping to shift demand.
  4. Collaboration Across the Supply Chain: From growers to wholesalers, collaboration is essential to improve sustainable practices in the flower industry.
  5. Innovative Solutions in Eco-Packaging: Research and new technologies are paving the way for more eco-friendly packaging options in floristry.

Thank you for joining us for this insightful conversation with David Bek. If you’re passionate about sustainable floristry, consider supporting local flower farms and making choices that prioritize the environment. For more information on David's work and resources on sustainable floristry,


[00:00:00] Roz Chandler: Thank you. I'm so delighted to welcome David Beck to our podcast today. David has been a guest on our podcast before, but a lot happens in a year, and I'm delighted to welcome David Beck again. David Beck is based at the Research Centre for Creative Economics at Coventry University, where he leads the Creative Economics.

[00:00:18] Roz Chandler: I don't know what Creative Economics is, but we can talk about that. I probably do that with my accounts. An ecological sustainability theme. David's research interrogates questions about the relationship between different types of economic activity and environmental sustainability. David currently explores these themes by undertaking research within horticultural supply chains, especially cut flowers, and is the co founder of the internationally renowned Sustainable Cut Flower Project.

[00:00:46] Roz Chandler: Which was established at 2016. Whoa, wow. Big introductions. So David, tell us our listeners today a little bit about you. They may not have listened to the first podcast, how you got to where you are today, your journey, what you're doing. Where are 

[00:01:03] David Bek: we going? Yeah. Okay. Thanks so much for having me on again, Ros.

[00:01:08] David Bek: It's always a pleasure. Great to see your podcast doing so well in, in the wider realms as well and getting all these themes discussed amongst people, getting people enthusiastic about flowers and sustainability and all sorts of things. Yeah, so me, so my background. Yeah. I'm, from Norfolk originally, rural area, brought up surrounded by things that grow.

[00:01:29] David Bek: Lincolnshire not that far away. I remember going to the sporting flower show, flower festival as a kid and just being all these tulips everywhere, all this kind of thing. So like flowers, horticulture, nature, it's just all, all in my blood kind of thing. Went to university, did geography with development studies.

[00:01:46] David Bek: A few years later, I did MSc and then PhD at Birmingham University, where I was looking through the PhD at Economic Development in South Africa, not long after the transition to democracy there. During follow up research I was doing in South Africa, I came across a thing called the Sustainable Harvesting Program, which was looking at Native species growing in the wild of South Africa, which were being harvested and then sold into international supply chains.

[00:02:21] David Bek: And at that point, they were turning up in bouquets in Marks and Spencers of all places. And this was just really interesting because it was all about conservation and it was all about harvesting stuff from the wild in the, for the purpose of conservation. That's interesting. So forth. And that got me into flowers, if you like.

[00:02:39] David Bek: In terms of academic research, it was 2006, the first time I stumbled onto the Flower Valley Farm as it's was known then where the sustainable harvesting program was based. We were so interested in this and how basically the harvesting of indigenous species was, hitting international trade to quite a considerable degree, because it wasn't too many years into all of this that they were, I think, shifting about a million bouquets through Marks and Spencers.

[00:03:07] David Bek: And The reason why it was linked to conservation was because it was giving an economic reason for conserving the land rather than turning it into something else. Because one of the farms, for example, had been under pressure to become a vineyard. And that would have just led to all the native habitat just being ripped up and replaced by a monoculture of vines.

[00:03:26] David Bek: So it was interesting, creating this economic argument for conservation of quite remarkable landscape. The density of species is just ridiculous. You can take a couple of square meters and there can be like a hundred species of all sorts of things in it. It's one of the most biodiverse excuse me, regions in the world.

[00:03:45] David Bek: Anyway, so that one thing leads to another, and us academics, we're always looking for ideas of things you can write into grant applications. So with colleagues at Durham and Newcastle University in 2010, we landed quite a good deal good grants, prestigious grants through the Leverhulme Foundation to look at in more detail at that particular supply chain and a whole business of, conservation through wild harvesting.

[00:04:14] David Bek: We also looked at a fair trade project in raisins as well in South Africa as a kind of different way of getting into these things. And it's just got me more and more Coventry University in 2015. And met a colleague called Jill Timms, who'd also joined the university. Jill had done some work in her PhD on flowers and certifications.

[00:04:37] David Bek: And then the next thing we knew by 2016, we'd we'd started a project called the Sustainable Cut Flowers Project, where Bundled in everything we were doing related to flowers and just said it was part of this project. And in the subsequent eight years, it's gone from strength to strength. We've even now, we've even now had a rebrand of the project and got a logo and stuff like that, which gosh, we've really made it with a new website and I've just spent, had a two hour training program on how to edit the website.

[00:05:04] David Bek: So my brain is just disappeared now because I've just baffled by all the things that need doing with that, but it's really good to see it. So yeah, so that's really where I'm at now in terms of research. The flower thing has really taken off. People are so interested. It engages people all the way from small scale growers, growing on a half a football pitch or quarter of a football pitch size, in the UK.

[00:05:26] David Bek: And, I've been to Mexico and seen foliage harvesting and trading going on over there. There, Jill's been to Kenya. We spend quite a bit of time in Amsterdam, obviously, because, Alsema near Amsterdam, because that's the global hub for the trading and I'm going over in a couple of weeks for a sustainability event there and going to the trade fairs as well, which are just always amazing seeing what the big guys are doing and what they're up to and what.

[00:05:53] David Bek: Bizarre shades of rose they've managed to create this year that maybe got seven different colors and one petal or something. But these are all the magic, magical things happening. And then you'll suddenly see a load of stuff about sustainable packaging and seafreight will be getting a big up, no doubt as well.

[00:06:08] David Bek: So yeah, I've really enjoyed it. I do other things as well beyond flowers, broader stuff in horticulture, but there's been so much interest in the flower stuff. It's really dominates my workload and. That's not a bad thing, cause it's quite. 

[00:06:21] Roz Chandler: So under the radar for so many years, if you think about it and, the Dutch start importing from Africa in the seventies, and we're still 2024 and we're still talking about it now.

[00:06:33] Roz Chandler: And we're still talking about sustainability and the chain, and we still know there's so much more to do, but it's coming to light. And the only way ultimately it doesn't come to light is that consumers start demanding. Or the price. It's one of two things, consumer demand and price, isn't it? The two that drive the market.

[00:06:51] Roz Chandler: So it's if consumers shout hard enough and the price is right, 

[00:06:55] David Bek: yeah, 

[00:06:56] Roz Chandler: then there might be a solution. But it's a long way to go. 

[00:07:00] David Bek: It is. So it's, yeah, you get, Absolutely bang on there around price. It's price is often the enemy of the best sustainable practices. And unfortunately people, we all, by and large will be tempted by a bargain or whatever.

[00:07:14] David Bek: So there's always a drive to keep the price down. And, obviously, we get to talk to retailers and the bouquet making companies and so forth, and they'll, nearly all say to you it's, All very well, but at the end of the day, if you make a bouquet that's 6. the 6. 99 one will sell.

[00:07:32] David Bek: Or if you're selling some daffodils for 99p and the price goes up, you take a daffodil out. And you still sell it for 99p and people will still buy it, but if you put it up to 1. 05, they won't, or less will, so price is such a huge thing, which brings you into the question of value, and too often we talk about and think about as consumers what the price of something, but what's the value actually of it to you?

[00:07:57] David Bek: We did see that during the first year or so of the pandemic when, people were stuck at home, people were Miserable. Whatever. And the sale of flowers actually really went up in many places. And the amount people would pay went up as well. There was one of the florists on our project said he'd got his first ever order of 300 pound bouquet.

[00:08:19] David Bek: So he was ecstatic. So people's value that they were prepared to ascribe to flowers went up because flowers meant so much more to them. It wasn't just an everyday item. It was basically all you got to look at all day. It was your connection with the outside world and all these kinds of things. So it's, so yeah.

[00:08:39] Roz Chandler: We launched our first online course in COVID teaching people how to grow their own cut flowers called Seed to Vars. It launched first of all in February 21. The response was phenomenal. People at home, They're going to grow. We're going to take them through an eight month program. We're going to teach them to everything from growing seeds to planting out, to pinching and the whole lot.

[00:08:58] Roz Chandler: And at the end we'll send you some seeds and at the end of it, you can put them in a vase and we'll show you how to do it. So in that eight month, it went mental. I can't tell you, cause here I was sitting in Covid thinking, what am I going to do? Switching a flower farm to go online and started this course.

[00:09:11] Roz Chandler: It's phenomenal. And now we're going to run it in its fifth year. But it started as the first in Covid. It started with this huge. And I, honestly, I put some Facebook ads out there and I was absolutely overwhelmed by it, and it was because people put value against doing something different and getting outside and planting themselves and growing flowers.

[00:09:33] Roz Chandler: And it's, yeah, it's how do you get that value over is quite tough. 

[00:09:38] David Bek: Yeah. And I think as you were hinting before, people's understand, the consumer understanding of what is a flower and where has it come from? Is often very limited and it's amazing how few people actually even think about that.

[00:09:51] David Bek: They look at the bouquet and it's almost like this assumption, oh, it must've just come from somewhere nice, not very far away. And, some artisan has polished each petal or whatever. And and here it isn't it amazing. And I find even when I'm like talking with colleagues about what we do and they can be quite, baffled initially and go, gosh, I'd never really thought that a flower actually has a whole journey.

[00:10:14] David Bek: Where it's, so many different journeys a flower can take. So obviously some do come from very locally because, networks like flowers from the farm where, people are literally growing it in one village and it's going to the florist in the next village and, and so forth.

[00:10:28] David Bek: So it's very short supply chain stuff. But then you've got a flower that can be growing in in Kenya or Ethiopia or Ecuador. It can be, popped on a ship or an aeroplane travels by lorry. It can go into Alsemere where it'll be auctioned. It'll whiz round on some trolleys in Alsemere, which will suddenly just deliver it to whichever warehouse it needs to go.

[00:10:51] David Bek: Then it'll get up, go on a ferry and come over to the UK. And then it'll go, from a warehouse to a wholesaler, to the bouquet maker, to the retailer. So the poor old flower is pretty exhausted, and all that time it's 

[00:11:04] Roz Chandler: That time. How long is that time from picking to get it on? 

[00:11:07] David Bek: It varies.

[00:11:08] David Bek: Obviously it's ship, it's weeks. Sometimes, with the flying, it can be 24 hours or so, between exiting a farm and getting somewhere not too far away from the market. But what it's done in the meantime is considerable. But obviously if it's been sea freighted, it can be four, five, six weeks, flowers sat there.

[00:11:29] David Bek: And that applies to food as well. You see sometimes tomatoes, advertisers, freshly picked on the side of certain retailers fresh to you, it'll say. And it's it's probably that tomato was, probably come from Southern Spain. It sat in a cooler for a month and then it's been allowed to ripen a bit and now it's turning up with you to eat and you think it's fresh, so it's that hidden nature of what's going on is fascinating.

[00:11:52] Roz Chandler: Yeah, it's a very, and also for it to make that journey, it's got to be heavily treated. It can't make that journey just as being picked and put in water. 

[00:12:00] David Bek: No, there's a lot, so there's the science around that, so much work goes on now because it's obviously about keeping the freshness of the stem.

[00:12:08] David Bek: So it's the cool chain is so vitally important, when they do have to do the calculations now, almost per, type of flower, because different flowers respond differently and so forth. But yeah, so it is very much about keeping an ambience, ambient state of around about five degrees typically in terms of the traveling.

[00:12:28] David Bek: There is some parts of the movement can involve water, but not necessarily all of them. But it is amazing how a flower revitalize if you keep the if you keep the temperature correct, and that's where you can get where breaks happen in journeys, that's when it can get very problematic.

[00:12:43] David Bek: If a cargo plane sits down in Dubai and then is delayed for a few hours, that can cause havoc. So there's lots of things go on and you do get these tales from traders about, how they've gone through a different hub to try and save a percentage on the price. But that hub that they've gone through has is not very good at managing things and managed to actually destroy their entire consignment.

[00:13:08] David Bek: I remember, someone moaning to me about how they'd lost about 30, 000 worth of their foliage because they'd gone through one country in Northern Europe rather than going straight into Amsterdam, or whatever. There's all these things go on. So it's an incredible industry just for the range of work that is done to get a stem at a low price.

[00:13:28] David Bek: to somebody's kitchen table. 

[00:13:32] Roz Chandler: I've just imported 58, 000 tulips from Holland actually not flowers, as in bulbs. And the driver, who was, I've been a very lonely person because I, he stood here for a long time telling me about all the hold ups at the ports. Everything horticultural and all the wastage there is now, because if you're held up for a couple of days while you're trying to check all your licenses.

[00:13:54] Roz Chandler: Cause the days of, the year before it was easier. This year it's harder, each year it's harder. And now they opened every single box. So how long that must've took, they opened every box and there was something like. I don't know, 30, 40, 50 boxes and they opened them all because they'd all been re taped again.

[00:14:11] Roz Chandler: And you thought they'd all been inspected and they all had bulbs in them. So you think that hold up is really quite significant. So a bulb, it doesn't matter, you make that a flower. 

[00:14:21] David Bek: Yeah, it can be very problematic and obviously with these flows of such products across the channel, The reasons aren't just about checking that you've got the right category of product or anything, that kind of customer base.

[00:14:35] David Bek: It can also be to ensure that other things aren't being smuggled. And that is one of the problems that's been occurring, around Rotterdam, Amsterdam area has been the infiltration of the drugs gangs who don't just trade in drugs, they trade in other things. And now that event, I think it was last year or the year before in one of the big buildings in Holland, and while we were all in there having our big event, on the top floor, apparently on the bottom floor, there was the police were doing a raid of a couple of the lorries, because, it is an incredible logistic sense around there, just thousands and thousands of massive trucks just whizzing around, moving flowers, bulbs to, to, from one place to another, and, keeping this trade moving.

[00:15:13] David Bek: If you just look at it as A remarkable feat of management and engineering. It is just incredible what is done. You can step back from that and go is that quite what the consumer expects? Does it matter if the consumer doesn't think about it? Is it all sustainable? That's another question altogether.

[00:15:31] David Bek: Which is where things get very tricky, because you then get into this little Because it's not labelled. 

[00:15:35] Roz Chandler: Go back to that labelling of flowers in a supermarket, don't we? None of them are labelled. They're a lovely barcode, which doesn't mean anything to anybody. And every so often, they will put up at the top, British seasonal flowers, and they might have one bouquet, but nobody knows which ones they are.

[00:15:50] Roz Chandler: They're just selling a bunch of British seasonal bouquets. And the rest are definitely not. But nobody knows. Nobody questions because nobody knows, because it's not labeled. I think if we got the labeling, maybe people would start to think, hold on, where did these come from? And maybe, and again, it's back to value again, because we'll still eat strawberries in February.

[00:16:09] Roz Chandler: And we know they're not grown in the United Kingdom in February. We'll still eat avocados out of season. So it's and we drink tea and coffee. So it's a really hard, sustainable argument. The only I, I sit trying to look at it logically and I think about farms in Kenya, for instance, all around the lake, which is not really a lake, it's more like a sea, but I think.

[00:16:32] Roz Chandler: There are no fish in that lake anymore and their pollution is fairly high and therefore the sustainable practices are pretty low. And I did interview someone on a podcast who went out there and tried to get into some of those farms. No chance. She managed one, I think, out of all of them.

[00:16:49] Roz Chandler: But that's disturbing. Because they can't, it's not sustainable. None of that's sustainable, of course. But then the other side of the argument, it's providing employment to local, locals. So then you think if they didn't do this, what would they do? And then the other side of the argument is are they being fairly paid and is it safe, debatable?

[00:17:09] Roz Chandler: So it's because we don't really know. I don't know. What's your opinion of what's going on? 

[00:17:14] David Bek: It's a really complex one. Like most things in life are these days. So many moving parts to it. Yeah, the, the flower industry in Kenya employs an incredible number of people, talking in the hundreds of thousands which, many of whom are women.

[00:17:28] David Bek: So in terms of female empowerment, it's important. The reason these countries such as Kenya and Ethiopia went on the export of flowers market in the first place was because they were under pressure from the IMF and the World Bank to export to be part of, to be part of the globalization process.

[00:17:48] David Bek: Because by exporting you earn, you get foreign exchange dollars, euros, what, when euros turned up which are really vital for dealing with debt and that kind of thing. Countries were told to liberalize their economies and do the exporting thing. So they do obey, those, mega institutions that obviously the UK has been a key part of for many years.

[00:18:09] David Bek: But then you can step back and go actually, is that the best thing for their economy? Should there be more actual food production for regional markets? So it's a very complex issue to make value judgments on. In terms of issues like the quality of jobs there's different.

[00:18:27] David Bek: research has come out about that. I've seen stuff that said a lot of the jobs are better than in equivalent sectors in those countries. So that's a good thing. Saw some on Ethiopia yesterday, talking about, the wages being typically above, the averages and so forth.

[00:18:43] David Bek: But on the other hand, there's this There's many problems have been, as you've said, have been found and NGOs have highlighted these in reports and so forth. The industry will reply by going please look at the good examples. Obviously fair trade's very active in in both. Kenya and Ethiopia has plenty of reports demonstrating, the higher levels of income and the greater security and the other projects that have been put in place to, to help people.

[00:19:09] David Bek: But it's, but ultimately the flowers are cheap really. 

[00:19:13] Roz Chandler: So the market drives it again. Yes, 

[00:19:15] David Bek: the market drives it. And if something's cheap, there's usually reasons why something's cheap. So it's a trick, I'm. Very hesitant to, I think it's, yeah, don't like to say people should not buy imported flowers, but I do say that we should all think about it and actually look to see if there are better choices that can be made.

[00:19:38] David Bek: And if people buy local seasonal, then that can be a very good thing. But obviously then you've got to be looking at how they've been produced just because something's local. If it's, if the local. is in a heated greenhouse being heated off the national grid or whatever then, you're actually, your carbon footprint can be quite considerable.

[00:19:56] David Bek: The research Rebecca Swin did a few years ago, her calculations showed that flowers from Kenya that were grown in the sun, but then flown, had the same carbon footprint as Dutch grown flowers in greenhouses because of, the energy footprint. So it's, it is a very complex story.

[00:20:15] David Bek: So it gets, you've got to, I think, get away from the sort of the geography of it as such. It's more about almost the, the life cycle. What's gone on with these products and how have they been grown? And there are some great initiatives going on. There are some rose growers I know in Holland and in Kenya who are making big efforts to really reduce carbon footprints.

[00:20:34] David Bek: I think there's one rose grower who's claiming that they're going to be, genuine net zero, not buying a non existent rainforest and claiming they've offset it, but actual, in terms of their, using all renewables for their energy and selling back to the grid and, using organic methods and so forth.

[00:20:50] David Bek: So I guess the point coming back there is that people such as yourself who have forums such as this, who are talking about these issues, are helping the whole wider process of putting pressure on commerce to change its practices and to, try and address these issues. And obviously legislation is very important too.

[00:21:09] David Bek: So the new legislation coming in, always, coming in through the EU that will affect EU based companies in terms of having responsibility for their supply chains is gonna, is really changing the dial because people are getting worried now that if you can't just say the problem's over there, it wasn't us, it's them.

[00:21:30] David Bek: And it's if you're buying from them. It's your job to make sure that they are doing the right thing. And if that means you've got to pay a bit more to them so they can so be it. Because, if your scope three emissions are bad or there's child labor and you're a big retailer in mainland Europe, you can get into serious trouble and be fine.

[00:21:50] David Bek: So it's that kind of, regulatory pressure that does tend to be the thing, it's basically the law and the laws of the market, i. e. if consumers won't buy things or will buy certain things, those are the two things that drive everything, ultimately. And there's 

[00:22:06] Roz Chandler: no horticultural minister, is there, to go to?

[00:22:08] Roz Chandler: I know we've got an agricultural minister, but there's no one we can really talk to, or there's no Political activation, or there's no, there's nowhere to go. And I think that's a big problem too, because we're not agriculture. We're growing flowers for consumers generally at the end of a supply chain.

[00:22:23] Roz Chandler: And it's very different. And so there's no voice. It's a very little voice. 

[00:22:28] David Bek: Yeah. And that, that, that's. Obviously a significant problem because when you look at any legislation, we've been hearing about lobbyists all the time in recent years. The certain organizations can lobby with immense ease because they have budgets and they actually put aside, so many hundred thousand pounds a year or whatever, just to employ people to go and lobby Parliament politicians, turn up at forums and so forth.

[00:22:50] David Bek: And if you haven't got that it's very tough. There is definitely. There is a need for more noise around some of these issues and that's one of the things we've been linked to a little bit within the project. We have given evidence to parliamentary inquiries and so forth and provided information that others have used.

[00:23:08] David Bek: To try and do some lobbying, but it would certainly help if the British flower industry had a more joined up approach and people were more engaged with each other to battle for common interest. That, that would make a considerable difference because there could be quite major changes quite quickly.

[00:23:24] David Bek: But you need changes in policy to enable these things to happen. 

[00:23:30] Roz Chandler: And there are more and more flower farmers, even just in the short time that I've been teaching flower farmers, because I teach flower farmers to be more profitable and I do some online work from my background in marketing.

[00:23:40] Roz Chandler: And I see a definite increase in people. Either Covid did it for them and they decided that they grow a few flowers and now we're going to have a flower farm and so they are transitioning out of corporate roles and having flower farms. I see an awful lot of that. Big, I've run some big online forums and cut flower Facebook group for for profit is about, I don't know, 6, 000 members.

[00:24:01] Roz Chandler: And so it's there was definitely people talking about it. There's definitely movement. I think my whole, if you think about even my Instagram and everything, the whole thing has gone exploded. And I do see all sorts of people moving out of their corporate roles and transitioning into flower farming.

[00:24:18] Roz Chandler: Doctors, anesthetists, people who've just had enough of their lives in general, corporate lives. Nurses are always very good at it, interestingly. So a lot of the social sector, I find, if I was breaking it down, it's quite interesting. But why people are doing it is quite interesting. They want a better lifestyle.

[00:24:35] Roz Chandler: They want to get out of the corporate world. They want to grow their own flowers. They care about society. Sustainability, they care about their community and that's interesting and more of that needs to happen. So the, I definitely think the numbers are going up. It's just whether they can collaborate and form hubs and start selling through hubs and be a much more, no other industry is as segmented as ours, really.

[00:24:57] Roz Chandler: All these flower farmers, like you say, have half a football pitch or a course for football pitch all over the country. And not many of them have come together to work out that the only way this is all going to work. As if you can get the flowers in the hands of the florist, we need, and we need good quality and we need big volume.

[00:25:15] Roz Chandler: This isn't about producing 10 buckets. This is about producing much bigger and all coming together to produce, like they do in the States. The States collaborate much better than we do and they have cooperatives much bigger than we'll ever have. And until we can get that working together and people working together and forming cooperatives that's the difficulty.

[00:25:34] David Bek: Yeah, definitely. And that also requires an open mind from the, from florists as well. To be looking beyond the usual suspects in terms of procuring flowers and to be open to, hub based models or whatever supplying them. And obviously the floristry sector's had a pretty bad time over in, generally, like so many like high streety type businesses have because of things changing.

[00:25:59] David Bek: Some doing very well, but, but there's, there are huge opportunities there. And it's just interesting hearing about that growth from you. And I've heard it from others as well. There's also the type of people you're talking about are exactly the kind of people who, if they do get their heads together have got.

[00:26:13] David Bek: that experience of work that would enable them to be great, ambassadors and so forth for, pushing the sector generally and really changing behaviors and and so forth, which would be great, and it just be generally good for the British localization, back in.

[00:26:32] David Bek: So there are local jobs, yes, these farms don't tend to employ a lot of people, but they always need some, a few people and breaks us down from the, I don't know how, I can't think of the right words really, but it's just the disconnected nature of a lot of life outside the cities now is, is a very significant factor and anything that can be done to reinvigorate those opportunities and reinvigorate rural areas is is fantastic.

[00:26:56] David Bek: So let's hope the industry can, really push on and make something of this. 

[00:27:01] Roz Chandler: I think, I'm a trustee of RAGS women in horticulture generally, and women changing jobs and transitioning in midlife, and going into horticulture and doing RSS, RHS exams and so on, and changing their lives.

[00:27:13] Roz Chandler: And I personally have had five trainee RAGS come and work for me, and now they all work for me. So they finish their RAG apprenticeship, if you like, which is a year, and then they come and work for me. It's a phenomenal scheme for people who want to change their lives and do something different. And now, so I have a sort of almost got a little community here actually, and they all come and we all sit and have lunch together outside under the tree and it's all, so you're creating much more than you think.

[00:27:40] Roz Chandler: Work. You're creating a community and they love working here and they think they're never going back to corporate world. I'm staying. I'm staying on Rossi's flower farm and we're just going to sit under this tree and eat cakes all day long. So it's it's great and they love it and I love it and it works.

[00:27:55] David Bek: So there 

[00:27:56] Roz Chandler: is a future for it all. 

[00:27:58] David Bek: Yeah, there is. And I think I was in a meeting this morning with the, an online meeting with some of the Sustainable Floristry Network folk, and from all over the world talking about, why everybody's involved in sustainable floristry, trying to, promote it and things.

[00:28:11] David Bek: And it really struck me that given just how grim a lot of the wider news is in the world at the moment, and particularly, and it's not just a case, I grew up and there was always the feeling that, you know someone might push a button and we'd all be blown up and that was fairly worrying, but it just seems almost worse now.

[00:28:27] David Bek: But particularly though, with the intractable nature of the changes in the climate where the data is just getting worse and worse. And every time you actually read any reputable report, there's some other thing that makes you go, Oh my God, what, what is this? And you feel so powerless to actually really do anything that's going to really shift the dial.

[00:28:45] David Bek: About you, but I don't really feel I can go out and change the the. The direction of the Gulf Stream today, that's a bit out of my league. But it's definitely going the wrong way, and I thought of Britain being 10 degrees colder or whatever is not really very high on my list of priorities, which could happen if the Gulf Stream flips and there is a significant chance of that now.

[00:29:04] David Bek: So the point is that There's a lot to worry about. And you can feel as though your efforts are like, just fiddling around with flowers. What's that? But it's actually, if you're doing something, it just, and you've got a community of people thinking in the same way, it just helps you to feel better about doing everything that you are doing.

[00:29:22] David Bek: And it isn't just about the commodity of flowers. It does become about way of life. People will be thinking more broadly about everything they do. in life, and then that message can spread. And particularly when you get movers and shakers, if you like, deciding they're going to, have a flower farm and think more sustainably in life, then, that, that's quite an influence, on a lot of people.

[00:29:44] David Bek: So you get the groundswell that maybe there is hope that we know we can get the right kind of vibe and collective action just to try and halt some of the worst of this stuff and just not do the really dumb stuff. Unnecessary, in life. Cause 

[00:29:58] Roz Chandler: I think I'm going to set up a sustainable flourished wholesaler.

[00:30:02] Roz Chandler: Cause that's the other thing. This product's not available. The product's not right. You can go to your local Dutch wholesaler, which a lot of them are, and you can buy cellophane and you can buy boxes and you can buy everything that's available. You can buy floral foam until it's going out of fashion.

[00:30:17] Roz Chandler: And you can still buy all of the unsustainable products. Everything is plastic. The florist entity is the worst in the world. I ordered from the Dutch wholesaler recently just to see what would arrive. So in came a box of flowers that all had plastic tops on them to protect them. They were hydrangeas and so they were in some sort of gel at the bottom which had a rubber band around it.

[00:30:39] Roz Chandler: They were all individually packed in a box. in a big box, which had then been tied. And so much cellophane, I can't tell you. So we're, we've already got an unsustainable, not even the flower, the packaging is so unsustainable. And then lots of people I talk to say we don't know where to get it all. We don't know where, we know we need to have sustainable moss and we know we need to do it on willow rings.

[00:31:02] Roz Chandler: And we know that our Christmas wreaths have to be sustainable, but actually it's not that easy. And they're right. It's not that easy. You have to go hunting for it. And it's. More costly. So again, there's a price to be paid, but it's about value again. It's, if I'm doing a funeral arrangement that's sustainable, I can tell you it would take much longer than it would if I was having Oasis and I was just throwing stems in the Oasis.

[00:31:24] Roz Chandler: And so time is money. It's more, it will take more time until you're really good at it. And two, it will be more, it just will be more expensive until you're back to value again. So it's about, yeah, it's about getting that right. But it will, I'm sure that will happen. There will be, if anyone's listening out there and wants to have a floristry wholesaler that supplies sustainable product, that would be amazing 

[00:31:46] David Bek: and brings it all together.

[00:31:48] David Bek: Definitely a huge issue, getting hold of those things. And you highlighted, real, one of the real problems as well, which is you as an individual can decide that you're going to be doing the right thing as much as you can. But when you and it's. covered in plastic and packaging that you don't want and it's your job to get rid of it in the right ways.

[00:32:08] David Bek: That, that has become your problem. And there's so much of that goes on, it's, again, when you're wandering around Alsemere where all the flowers are and everything's being delivered, you can look in some of the bins and you're like, blimey, there's enough plastic there to, I don't know, make a billion straws, for example.

[00:32:23] David Bek: Yeah, it's a real problem. So shall I talk a little bit about plastics packaging waste project then, Ros, as you've teed that up rather well. And the events we held at Coventry University about three or four weeks ago. Just over a year ago, we set up a group, a working group within the UK industry on plastics, packaging and waste.

[00:32:47] David Bek: The idea being to try and reduce and better manage all of them. We had over 20 people volunteered from the industry to be part of our group doing online meetings and so forth. We had Coventry University and then a little bit of money in the end as well from Surrey through Jill Timms, his work there.

[00:33:05] David Bek: And as a result, we've produced our. booklet on plastics packaging and waste and a guide to more sustainable floristry practices. And, talking about some of the products that you can use and so forth. And Dr Angela Coulton did a lot of the research and work on writing that for Petal and Twig fame.

[00:33:26] David Bek: And Angela used to work for DEFRA, so she really understands the the policy side of it as well. So that's actually been a really exciting project. And what we did at the launch at Coventry, we chose Coventry Cathedral because it's right next to the university. It's an amazingly beautiful structure for anybody who hasn't been.

[00:33:44] David Bek: And we got in six, florists offered to do displays on, on the day including Shane Connolly and the Bath Flower School and Nicola Hill who's local to us, who got a RHS gold. Dental 

[00:34:00] Roz Chandler: blooms. Yeah. 

[00:34:01] David Bek: Dental blooms. Six people. Apologies to the other three. It's all on the website.

[00:34:05] David Bek: You can see who they are, everybody was. Yeah, and they did these displays and what we did was we got, we had about 60 people in overall attending, which was the most we could have in there. It was quite funny because the general public was still allowed in as it was a cathedral. You 

[00:34:17] Roz Chandler: said it was funny.

[00:34:19] Roz Chandler: It 

[00:34:20] David Bek: was quite comical because one of the displays was about funeral flowers and they had a wicker coffin. On the table. So people were like walking in and there's a wicker coffin right in front of them with a pair of wellies stuffed with flowers on top. So I don't know what they made of it, but anyway, so we suddenly, looked up and there were people from the public just walking in and, listening to Shane Connolly.

[00:34:42] David Bek: talking about his display. And they'd have had no idea they were listening to King Charles's florist talking about this thing. It was just some bloke with a slightly, Irish accent talking, and then they wander off and do their prayers or whatever they were doing. So anyway, getting away from that frivolous extra detail.

[00:34:57] David Bek: Yeah, so it was really good. So everybody went round and listened to everybody else talking about their what they'd done, how they'd done it in a sustainable way. And two of Two of the presentations, demonstrations there were around funeral flowers, as part of the farewell flowers movement.

[00:35:15] David Bek: So it was good. Then we had a panel for an hour, a panel discussion with two different panels. Which included, so we had Johnny Young from JZ Flowers who do supply into a couple of the big retailers, including Aldi. We had a chat from Bloomin Wild as well, the online retailers, and it was really great because, they talk very openly about what they're doing to try.

[00:35:39] David Bek: to reduce their packaging and waste, how they take plastic out, what the targets are that are coming through, and they showed examples of the product they use. We, it was just really nice because we had everybody right, from people supplying the big people right down to people growing, on their quarter of a call it a football pitch kind of thing, which is just so crucial that people don't get into silos and think, we're this and we're against that or they're the enemy because they're saying nasty things about us.

[00:36:08] David Bek: It's just vital. Everybody says actually, we all need to reduce our plastics packaging and better manage our waste. Let's all talk about this. Let's all share ideas. And there was some really interesting collaborations that sort of had formed by the end of the day. with with people.

[00:36:23] David Bek: So it was a really enjoyable day. And as I say, it showed the power of collaboration, but using good research, underpinning it. We did have someone from the university Dr. Anna Bogosh, who's an expert on sort of biochemistry, she actually understands what plastic is and what the different types of plastic are in great detail.

[00:36:45] David Bek: So she was also a really interesting person to have there because she could talk to people around, the differences in terms of recyclability, how much fossil fuels are required for creating different types of plastic and what the possibilities are in the future. Yeah. Where some form of packaging is needed, what might be better.

[00:37:03] David Bek: So it was, yeah, it was really positive and it was a great day. All the information is available on our website, which I'm sure you'll pop in the show notes for us and people can download a copy of this exhilarating booklet.

[00:37:17] David Bek: Yeah. Yeah. So that's downloadable. There's actually, this is, the digital version is longer because there was extra stuff, we didn't, a lot of links. There's no point putting links in a print book, print version, but all the links are in the the online version. There's lots of stuff there and people have been very positive.

[00:37:34] David Bek: And we had some flower schools there as well. Some, teachers from a local college came along who teach the floristry courses, so they were just excited to have these opportunities to, see other ways of doing things than floral foam and so forth. 

[00:37:49] Roz Chandler: They're still teaching, yeah.

[00:37:50] David Bek: Yeah, which they have to teach because it's part of the curriculum. So that's another issue is how you actually get the curricula changed so that you can have, what we might call the sustainable, more progressive stuff as well. That was Yeah, so it was a very good thing, and we're going to be, a couple of weeks time, we'll have a report out from the event, and a video as well.

[00:38:09] David Bek: That will end up on our website for people to have a little look at, and hopefully inspire. The URL of 

[00:38:14] Roz Chandler: your website, David. 

[00:38:16] David Bek: It is. It is. It's ever really snappy. Sustainableflowersresearch. org. Okay. 

[00:38:23] Roz Chandler: That's okay. 

[00:38:25] David Bek: Yeah. Sustainableflowersresearch. org. Yeah, and that's a new version of our website.

[00:38:31] David Bek: It's just been redone so that it all fits together because the editing Jill and I had been doing on the old one over the years had gone a bit haywire, funnily enough. We've had it redone. 

[00:38:40] Roz Chandler: And keep adding more and in the end it goes down. 

[00:38:42] David Bek: And then things suddenly appear in places they shouldn't and all that kind of thing.

[00:38:47] Roz Chandler: You're a website guru after your two hours of training. Oh yeah, I know everything. So some quick questions for you. What was your childhood dream job then when you were in Norfolk? Did you always think you're going to end up being a And academic and that you're going to be doing research and that, no.

[00:39:03] Roz Chandler: I didn't even know these things 

[00:39:04] David Bek: existed, gosh, I originally wanted to be a farmer because who wouldn't, I still haven't achieved one of my goals in, bucket list, which is to drive a combine harvester. Cause I just used to in the evening sneak in the fields and go and, where they left the combine harvester in in August to be left overnight and I'd go and sit on it.

[00:39:22] David Bek: Oh gosh, I still think of those glorious days. And then obviously I wanted to play cricket for England which I've got considerably more, I had considerably more chance of driving a combine harvester than that, but so there you go, you can be dream. One 

[00:39:33] Roz Chandler: of my friends is Darren Goff, so I'll tell you about that one day.

[00:39:38] David Bek: Oh, of course, yeah, he's around your area, he's a Goffy crumb. 

[00:39:40] Roz Chandler: Yeah, Goffy. Yeah, he does, I went to look at their kitchen quite recently because they'd had a new kitchen and he couldn't believe how this person could turn up in his house and open all the cupboards to have a look. Because I wanted to see how thick, I actually wanted to see how thick the cupboard door was.

[00:39:54] Roz Chandler: He thought I was looking inside the cupboards and I absolutely wasn't. But he says he will never get over the fact this mad woman turned up and looked inside all his cupboards. So yeah, I do know him. 

[00:40:04] David Bek: So 

[00:40:05] Roz Chandler: if you won the lottery, what would you do? I've told you today you've won millions. What would you do?

[00:40:09] David Bek: Millions? Oh gosh. Obviously I'd spend most of my life watching cricket probably and then do some nice, probably fund some of these projects. I think need funding as well. Definitely wouldn't be spending it on expensive cars that burn lots of carbon. There you go. I can be sanctimonious and say that.

[00:40:29] David Bek: Yes, 

[00:40:30] Roz Chandler: I've got an electric van so I can be really sanctimonious. 

[00:40:33] David Bek: Yeah, there's a solar 

[00:40:35] Roz Chandler: that feeds the electric to feed the van. There you go. How sanctimonious is that? 

[00:40:39] David Bek: That's terrific. Yeah, no it's funny. When I was a, when I was a young lad, it was, young man, driving a car, fast ish car was great.

[00:40:45] David Bek: Now it just makes my heart sink to even think of that kind of thing because you just know, the impact. So it's funny how our perceptions change according to the world around us, but you've still got to have some fun in life. But there are some very big responsibilities we've all got nowadays.

[00:41:01] Roz Chandler: Yeah, I won't, I'll never stop traveling, that's for sure. And there's a price for that too. But everything has a price. It's about knowing about it, isn't it? 

[00:41:09] David Bek: So what's 

[00:41:09] Roz Chandler: next for you? You've obviously done a master's, a PhD, now we're researching. What next? 

[00:41:13] David Bek: I'll be You know, I made a prof just over a year ago, which was rather nice.

[00:41:19] David Bek: And I'll be, this role I've got now I've been in moved research centers within the universities. So I'm now in the Center for Creative Economies. So I've got exciting new things to do with. Putting that research center on the map in terms of the flower stuff. It just the interest of the need keeps growing and growing.

[00:41:37] David Bek: We have got two or three projects on the go, we'll be keeping the plastics packaging and waste stuff going because it started so well. We have to really want to push that. We've. I do a lot of work as well with the Dutch industry on foliage, because of the, the foliage industry, wild harvested foliage is about 10 percent of all volumes, or in the cut flower industry, but some interesting things go on in terms of how some of that foliage.

[00:42:02] David Bek: gets to market. So I'm working with them on trying to cut out the more unsustainable things and make it more sustainable. But the good thing about foliage is if you're getting it from the wild, it comes back to that point that you are creating a market need to leave trees and bushes where they are, 

[00:42:21] Roz Chandler: not chop them down.

[00:42:22] David Bek: So in terms of carbon footprint and things like that. Wild foliage is a really interesting commodity. But yeah, so that's a really exciting project, which I really enjoy. And hopefully it's going to be very impact driven in terms of producing, an assurance program that will raise the standard in terms of how these commodities are harvested and traded.

[00:42:42] David Bek: And then. that we are involved in a new project which is very interesting, the theme of which has been mentioned in this discussion, but we're still under embargo from the funders. But hopefully in a couple of weeks I'll be able to drop you a note and you can say, oh this is a new thing that's happening that Surrey and Coventry Universities are involved in, and oh this is interesting because but you will be very interested when you come back.

[00:43:06] David Bek: hear about it, but it's good stuff. And I've got, also got the invite to be the keynote speaker at the Flowers from the Farm Conference in January. But she's terrifying, obviously. So I look forward to getting my brief from from the committee as to what they want me to witter on about. And I'm sure it won't be combine harvesters or England cricketers.

[00:43:26] David Bek: But yeah, but I'm looking forward to that as well. Once I've got my, my, my words sorted for the audience that will be there. 

[00:43:35] Roz Chandler: David, I want to thank you for coming over again. Let's not leave it another year. Indeed. And I'm waiting for your email with with excitement to see what the next project is and we can talk about that one.

[00:43:46] Roz Chandler: And my heart's in this direction. When you do an environmental science degree in the early eighties, when anybody didn't know how to spell the word environment, I think it's always been in me. And I think, yeah, 1985 I graduated and I only learned how to spell the word environment at that stage.

[00:44:04] Roz Chandler: So yeah, don't leave it another year, come over soon and tell us what the new project is very soon. But thank you very much for joining us. 

[00:44:10] David Bek: Pleasure, Roz. Thank you so much. Cheers.