An Empirical Analysis On Competitiveness And Development Of China's Cut Flower Industry

Cut flower, is kind of flowers which were cut from plants and used for decorations, as China roses or chrysanthemums and so on. Nowadays, the cut flowers have become bulk commodities, volumes of consumption raised sharply by 25% each year on average.China's commercial cut fower production began in 1980s, and production acreages and yields have experienced rapid growths since 2001. Now China's cut flowers has become dominant varieties among its floral industry especially floral products for export, which attracted attentions from flower practitioners all around the world. The main characteristics of China's cut flower industry is as followsrhigly concentrated production areas, most of consumptions arised in big cities,wide-area distributions and seasonal consumptions and productions,transprotation most airlifted, volume of exports grows fast but markets restricted in countries and regions nearby. China's cut flower industry has obvious particularity distinguished from other floral varieties and fresh products, so analyse of this rising industry is necessary and significative. As the rising star in the world's cut flower industry, what is the status of China's cut flowers in recent years? Is it competitive or not? What about its development prospects? What's the characteristic of demand and supply, and its marketing channels? China has vast territory and various kinds of climates and environments,so the competitiveness of cut flower industry among different areas around China is different or not? If not, what are the main influencing factors, and how much impact they have?The research objective of this paper is to carry out an empirical study on competitiveness of China's cut flower industry, and influencing factors caused gaps of competitiveness.The theoretical foundation of the paper is Porter's "Diamond Model"and competitiveness theory. An comprehensive analyse including production, marketing, consumption, trade and all important economic problems about China's cut flower industry is completed, and main influencing factors are found out. Because different areas have different resources and conditions, a factor analysis is applied to measure the competitiveness of cut flower industries in different provinces around China. It is concluded that the international competitiveness of China's cut flower industry is growing and competitive advantages in main export markets are become more and more obvious,but because of weaknesses in R&D,China's cut flower industry does not have the strength to compete with the developed countries; China has rich resources and comparative advantage in developing the cut flower industry,as the demand for cut flower products grows consistently all round the world and floral industry in developed countries are transferring to low-cost countries, China's cut flower industry has good opportunity to be developed; the competitiveness of cut flowers in different provinces is not balanced, the determining factor is industrial scale, and technological factor has little influence on total competitiveness among these provinces. At last, this paper made a case study about China's cut flowers'main production and export base—Yunnan Province.The reason for the large industrial scale Yunnan has reached is that it has climate advantage towards other provinces, and Yunnan has formed cut flowers' industrial clusters,which could not be copied by its competitors in short times.In the end, the paper gives some suggestions for China's cut flower industry to make good use of its competitive advantages.The study has fully proved industrial clusters, insisted of related and supporting industries, plays a key role in influencing competitiveness of cut flower industries.However, latest industrial cluster theories about its formation, evolution, development or so are not applied in analyzing China's cut flower clusters, which need follow-up studies.