Yahoo News 23 Jun 09;
NAIVASHA, Kenya (AFP) – Green campaigners in Kenya, one of the world's top flower exporters, called Tuesday for a boycott of flowers from some 30 farms contributing to the degradation of Lake Naivasha.
The executive director of the Indigenous bio-diversity environmental conservation association (IBECA), James Kahora, said his group would travel to Europe to promote the "Save Lake Naivasha" campaign.
"We are ready to travel even to the Holland market and various supermarkets in the United Kingdom to have our case heard as these flower farms are killing Lake Naivasha," he told reporters.
Lake Naivasha, some 100 kilometres (60 miles) northwest of Nairobi, is a stunning freshwater lake considered one of the top 10 bird-watching spots in the world and one of the continent's jewels of bio-diversity.
Environmentalists and biologists say that water extraction by the dozens of flower farms around the lake has contributed to a sharp decline in water levels that will eventually destroy the local ecosystem.
Maasai herders have further complained that flower farms have also closed natural corridors, making it impossible for them to water their livestock.
"The farmers found the Maasais here and we shall not stand back and watch as the only natural resource we know is killed by profit-oriented investors," Andrew Ole Korinko, a local Maasai leader, said.
IBECA and various demonstrators on Monday prevented a local farm from extracting water from the lake through a deep canal.
Local MP John Mututho gave the 30 farms targeted by the campaign two weeks to fill the canals they have dug around the lake.
Many of the sprawling flower farms around Lake Naivasha and across the country are foreign-owned and send tonnes of roses and other flowers daily to European capitals and other markets such as Japan.
The horticultural sector is one of Kenya's top exporters but wildlife tourism is also a key source of revenue for the east African country.
