The community around a flower establishment is, in every way, essential for the sustainability of the business. This is a notion that Red Lands Roses, the premier Kenyan grower of socially conscious haute couture roses, knows just too well. It is this community that provides the required workforce to keep everything going at the flower farm.
Red Lands Roses employs different strategies to ensure that its people—the employees—have the very best conditions to work well and guarantee that the flower farm thrives in its course of producing the best quality flowers that are loved all over the world. How, you may wonder, does the flower farm achieve this? Well, let’s get a clear idea of it all.
Ever Striving to Keep Its People Contented and Happy to Work on the Farm
Red Lands Roses employs roughly 800–985 employees, depending on the work on the farm. Sometimes seasonal jobs such as setting up the greenhouses during the expansion processes require additional labor force, hence, the need to hire more people.
The current 44 hectares of the farm’s flower-planted area has 50% male and 50% female employees. And just for your info, many of the employees have been working on the farm for more than 20 years.
As a member of the Agricultural Employers Association (AEA), which is under the auspice of the Kenya Plantation and Agricultural Workers Union (KPAWU)—a key trade union in Kenya, representing about 200,000 workers in the agriculture sector, including those in tea, coffee, and flower industries—Red Lands Roses observes the principles of these institutions.
Red Lands Roses:
“Our first asset is our people who work daily on the farm to produce the most beautiful roses in the world. Their health, welfare, and safety are a priority.”
Thus, in its efforts to keep its people contented and happy to work on the farm, the rose grower goes above and beyond; often affording its employees more than what is stipulated in the associations’ tenets. After all, happy and satisfied workers translate to better work delivery, and in turn, better quality flowers that measure up to Red Lands Roses—and global flower markets—standards.
Better Employee Remuneration
As per the employee representative unions mentioned, flower farms across the country do have a specified minimal amount of wage they should pay their staff. The different employers are required to adhere to this—or better it, but never to pay anything below that amount—to safeguard the workers' welfare.
On its part, however, Red Lands Roses chose to better the rates. The flower farm pays its people substantially higher wages compared to what is indicated in AEA’s guidelines. The notion is to keep its employees comfortable and eager to work better, hence ensuring its roses remain among the very best in the industry.
Day Care Center Enabling Women to Work With Peace of Mind
Practically half of Red Lands Roses employees are women. Oftentimes, the mothers find themselves in a difficult position requiring them to work while at the same time taking care of their little children. Red Lands Roses offers a solution for this.
Gitothua Day Care Centre (DCC) was built in 2003 as a project of the flower farm’s FLO - Max Havelaar Joint Body, with funding from other institutions as well. The DCC has, since then, been expanded and can now accommodate up to seventy children aged between three months and three years. Most of them are Red Lands Roses employees’ babies and a few come from disadvantaged families in the neighborhood, who are accommodated free of charge.
All proceeds from the roses sold at Red Lands Roses flower shop at the Gigiri Craft Center, go to the maintenance of the DCC. This, alongside vegetables and fruits grown in its garden, and water from its well, makes the DCC an independent establishment with its own employees — nine nannies/caretakers, a head nurse, a cook, and a gardener — who take care of the children as their parents work. Alongside nutritious food, the DCC also offers breastfeeding spaces, and sleeping areas for the kids, as well as a classroom. And to make it even more operational, it is undergoing a revamp.
Medical Program for Employees
The flower farm has a self-insured medical scheme that caters to the employees. Their other dependents are also included in this program. It, also, has a doctor and a clinician at its clinic, who take care of the employees’ medical needs. This is, in addition to its partnership with a nearby health facility for the treatment of its staff members whenever needed. With these facilities in place, the employees, do not only get first aid but also, actual treatment.
For expectant mothers, the flower farm offers a maternity leave of 90 days, alongside their annual leave just to guarantee they are adequately ready to get back to work after the childbirth process. They take these leave days at least two weeks ahead of schedule, while prenatal and post-natal services are also accessible. Prospective fathers are, also, granted paternity leave in such cases.
There is, also, a gender committee that addresses most of the issues that women face in the community; most of which are taboo topics. This is, along with, anonymous employee surveys to help address other issues as well as curb any cases of sexual harassment. Just the same way, now and then, Red Lands Roses organizes counseling programs for the employees, and also checkups for different conditions. Such include a recent project for eye healthcare, where it provided its dedicated employees with a pair of glasses adapted to their sight.
School Fees Allowance for Employees and Maasai Community Girls’ Education
Recognizing that education is essential for all, at Red Lands Roses, all workers enjoy a school fees allowance which they are afforded for their kids. While free primary school education is available in Kenya, secondary education is not adequately catered to. Red Lands Roses education program, accordingly, helps address the education costs for these children. Kids aged up to 18 are eligible for this.
The flower farm has, also, been supporting the education of bright girls from the Maasai community. Namaiyana Maasai Women Group in Ngong—a satellite town roughly 15 miles from Kenya’s capital, Nairobi—brings together hundreds of women who produce and sell beaded jewelry. For some years, Red Lands Roses has been supporting their cause by incorporating their artistry into special events like Mother’s Day, Valentine's, Easter, and international exhibitions.
The farm has, for instance, been buying these Maasai women’s beaded ornaments which it freely offered its clients during events. The earnings have helped the Maasai women educate several girls in their region. You’ve probably received one of these beaded pieces of jewelry when you visited the Red Lands Roses’ booth at the IFTEX or IFTF!
Meal Subsidies for Employees and a Communal Vegetable Garden for Them
The flower farm, likewise, provides employees with healthy and nutritious meals at very affordable rates, at its cafeteria. Workers spend less than half of what they’d ordinarily pay for these meals elsewhere outside the farm, with Red Lands Roses subsidizing 75% of the cost of their meals. This guarantees them savings on food.
Alongside this, the workers have access to a communal organic vegetable garden right at the flower farm. From the garden, they get nutritious greens for their home consumption. This communal organic vegetable garden affords them a variety of fresh vegetables and other kitchen herbs.
The Bicycle-to-Work Program
Just a few years ago, Red Lands Roses introduced a program that helps its staff to acquire a bicycle to, not only make commuting to work easier but also improve their general physical fitness and well-being. In collaboration with World Bicycle Relief—which has designed bicycles uniquely adapted to African conditions and assembled locally using parts brought from the best manufacturers in the world—the flower farm facilitates the delivery of these bicycles to its employees.
It covers 70% of the bicycle’s cost while the remaining 30% is settled by the employee on an advance basis. This green strategy has seen great success with many employees now using these bicycles to commute to work every day.
“We Want Our People to Flourish Just the Same Way Our Flowers Do”
For Red Lands Roses, it is all about ensuring that its people are comfortable and happily flourishing. From its daycare center for young children to its other programs like health, and education programs, the bicycle project, the communal organic vegetable garden, and others, the social efforts are all dedicated to ensuring the well-being of the employees; and by extension, the community around the farm.
After all, when the employees are happy and thriving in their different ways, then it is reflected in the beautiful and quality flowers that are sustainably grown on this Kenyan rose farm, for the global market.
Photos by Red Lands Roses (@red_lands_roses_plc).
