The UK Soil Association (SA) environmental lobby plans to cripple horticulture airfreight from Africa over the protests of victimised Kenyan producers of flowers, organic cucumbers, carrots, beans and cauliflower.

The Soil Association is "inviting views" on the issue until September, when it may opt for a total ban that would be mean labelling air freighted produce so that they effectively lose its "organic" status due to high number of "food miles".

Many feel that such a move would destroy the livelihoods of tens of thousands of smallholders in Kenya, Ethiopia, Uganda and Tanzania, forcing them back into poverty, says a report in The New Zealand Herald.

"Who emits more greenhouse gases?" asks Kenyan farmer Charles Kimani among his avocado trees. "A Kenyan or a Briton?"

The average Briton emits 30 times more carbon than a Kenyan, according to World Bank figures - or 9.4 tonnes of CO2 compared with 0.3 tonnes, said the newspaper report.

"A ban on our export market will be death for us," says Mr Kimani, who has put his children through school and college from the profits made from fruit and vegetables on just three hectares of land.

"The SA proposal is just another non-tariff barrier to trade among the many that already exist," says Eustace Kiarii, chief of an organisation representing Kenyan organic farmers. Farmers from Kenya and developing countries are not asking for special trade access, but to be allowed to trade competitively."

Organic produce is the fastest-growth area of Africa's horticultural industry, with cut flowers and other high-value products like dried herbs and essential oils.