The 12th Godawari Flower Competitive Exhibition 2018 kicked off on Thursday at Jawalakhel football ground. The four day exhibition is showcasing a wide variety of godawari flowers including others.

Kumari Nursery, Hamro Flower Nursery and S R Nursery are some of the flower nurseries attending the exhibition.

Prabindra Maharjan, proprietor of Kumari Nursery, gave up his UK permanent resident certificate and returned to Nepal to handle his family’s flower business.

Citing the flourishing flower business in the country, Maharjan said he abandoned the opportunity to live and work abroad.

Started in 1995 by his father Indra Maharjan, the business is now being jointly looked after by Maharjan and his son. His family has been expanding their business at different places including one in Chitlang. Kumari Nursery has Kumari Flori Farm as its sister nursery.  

Maharjan said that the demand of cactus flower has been increasing as he recently sold around 2,000 pieces of cactus plant in a month.

It used to take a year to sell the same number of cactus flowers a few years back, he said.  The price of cactus flower ranges from Rs50 to Rs5,000 depending on the size, quality and varieties.

He imports the seed of cactus plants and cactus from Netherland. The nursery has 200 ranges of cactus. Moon cactus is best selling cactus among others as the nursery sold more than 25,000 moon cactus last year, he said. The price of cactus ranges from Rs300 to Rs1,200, he said.

Participants at floriculture exhibition said that the floriculture business has been growing due to increasing awareness and interest towards flowers among people within ten years. Similarly, the trend of indoor gardening has been increasing.

The exhibitors said that it is hard to get labour as many prefer to go abroad even though they are offering high salaries. Meanwhile, exhibitors highlighted land shortage in urban areas and increasing pollution as major hurdles for flower businesses.

Hamro Flower Nursery, one of the participants in the exhibition was offering four different types of godawari flower with prices ranging from Rs50 to Rs1,000. Indra Bahadur Ghalang, proprietor of the nursery has been in the flower business for eight years.

According to him, the nursery has been making sales of around Rs150,000 a month.

He expects to earn Rs400,000 from the exhibition. This type of exhibition helps to promote business among potential customers, he said.

SR Nursery, another exhibitor has been offering godawari flowers from Rs60 to Rs400 per vessel. The nursery has been importing seeds of various flowers from India. Permanent types of flower are their best selling item, said a staff at SR nursery. The nursery has been offering various types of flowers from Rs40 to Rs4,500.

The nursery records transaction of around Rs200,000 per month, he said.

According to a report of Central Bureau of Statistics-2015-16, the Kathmandu Valley produced 5.17 million pieces of seasonal flower worth Rs108.22 million.

Similarly, the country has been producing 10.57 million pieces of seasonal flowers amounting to Rs221.74 million.