No recipe exchange tonight, so in its place you get a Quartz report on the pros and cons of the global food market:
During harvest last year, banana farmers in Jordan and Mozambique made a chilling discovery. Their plants were no longer bearing the soft, creamy fruits they’d been growing for decades. When they cut open the roots of their banana plants, they saw something that looked like this.
Scientists first discovered the fungus that is turning banana plants into this rotting, fibrous mass in Southeast Asia in the 1990s. Since then the pathogen, known as the Tropical Race 4 strain of Panama disease, has slowly but steadily ravaged export crops throughout Asia. The fact that this vicious soil-borne fungus has now made the leap to Mozambique and Jordan is frightening. One reason is that it’s getting closer to Latin America, where at least 70% of the world’s $8.9-billion-a-year worth of exported bananas is grown…
Even if it takes longer to arrive, the broader ravaging of the commercial banana appears inevitable. And we don’t need to imagine what that would mean for banana exports—the exact scenario has already happened. Starting in 1903, Race 1, an earlier variant of today’s pathogen, ravaged the export plantations of Latin America and the Caribbean. Within 50 years, Race 1 drove the world’s only export banana species, the Gros Michel, to virtual extinction. That’s why 99% of the bananas eaten in the developed world today are a cultivar called the Cavendish, the only export-suitable banana that could take on Race 1 and live to tell…
But the bigger difference now is that, compared its 20th-century cousin, Tropical Race 4 is a pure killing machine—and not just for Cavendishes. Scores of other species that are immune to Race 1 have no defenses against the new pathogen. In fact, Tropical Race 4 is capable of killing at least 80%—though possibly as much as 85%—of the 145 million tonnes (160 million tons) of bananas and plantains produced each year, says Ploetz.
And at $8.9 billion, bananas grown for export are only a fraction of the $44.1 billion in annual banana and plantain production—in fact, bananas are the fourth-most valuable global crop after rice, wheat, and milk. Where are the rest of those bananas sold? Nearly nine-tenths of the world’s bananas are eaten in poor countries, where at least 400 million people rely on them for 15-27% of their daily calories. And that’s the really scary part. Since the first Panama disease outbreak, bananas have evolved from snacks into vital sustenance. And this time there’s no back-up banana variety to feed the world with instead…
And while millions of farmers feed their families with home-grown bananas, many millions more use income from growing them to buy other crops. Bananas are the most important export commodity for Ecuador, Panama, Costa Rica, and Belize. They’re in the top three in Colombia, the Philippines, Guatemala, Honduras, and Cameroon. That’s a lot of the developing-world economy reliant on a very vulnerable crop. “This disease is a problem, not only because of its potential impact on the price and availability of our favorite fruit, but also because it’s a life-changing event for the people in developing countries who rely on bananas as a staple food and incomes,” Alice Churchill, a scientist studying plant biology at Cornell University, told the Cornell Sun, “Those affected by [Panama disease] lose both their livelihoods and an important source of nutrition.” …
Also, a short history of the American “banana barons pioneer[ing] the industrial agriculture model familiar today, maximizing land, minimizing labor, and vertically integrating in order to send their product far and wide,” United Fruits’ successful campaign marketing bananas as “the fruit of the common man”, the invention of the Banana Republic, and the historical risks of monoculture disaster. Enjoy!
Ol'Froth
Personally, I don’t care for bananas, but I know how an important crop it is…this is scary.
Arclite
Doesn’t matter too much. All the best banana growing nations will be uninhabitable in 20 years due to climate change. Although I suppose it would be hot enough in Northern California by then to grow them there.
Tommy
Banana related. Did you know the best coffees in the world grow in the shade of bananas? I am a huge coffee snob but I didn’t realize how little I knew about coffee until I started to watch Dangerous Grounds. When you see “fair trade” you might not realize what it means. In the “true” sense you can strip the land and plant coffee. However the best method is for coffee to be in the shade. Seems bananas for some reason work the best.
Tommy
@Ol’Froth: I don’t think most individuals understand how important single crops are for many people in this world. Heck it is one of the reasons global warming worries me so much. I maybe land locked here in southern IL but the vast majority of the world lives right near an ocean. About their only food source. Kind of makes sense. When the oceans start to rise things are going to go sideways really quickly.
raven
Ya’ll never heard of the Banana Marines I spect.
Chyron HR
B-but God made the holy banana in His perfect image. Kirk Cameron told me so. :c
Barbara
There are at least two foods that I remember tasting better in my childhood: bananas and Oreos. Turns out I am just old enough that I probably did get to eat Gros Michel bananas, so it’s not just my imagination that bananas used to be creamier. Oreos were also creamier back in the day, when they were made with lard (the new recipe is kosher).
Not so much of a cookie-eater anymore, but I will miss bananas when they are gone.
ranchandsyrup
No bananas, no banana stand. I’ll have nowhere to keep my cash.
raven
No bananas on fishing boats:
Mike in NC
Somebody better inform the Bluth family to shut down their frozen banana stands.
Violet
Yet another perils of monoculture. There are a lot of varieties of bananas out there but most are not suitable for export–they don’t travel well. So the Cavendish has become the banana of choice for export because it travels. As the banana for export it has also become the plantation banana, which means monoculture. Fields and fields of the same thing. That means vulnerability to disease because there’s no built in defenses in the ecosystem.
Origuy
The reason banana flavored candy doesn’t taste much like the bananas you buy in the store is that when they were creating the flavoring back in the 50s, they were basing it on the Gros Michel. Supposedly, the flavoring is very similar.
Tommy
@Violet: I love bananas. I also love the range of foods I can get. But I live in southern IL. Honestly, maybe I shouldn’t be able to get bananas here in December. You know, just saying.
Francis
Cavendish bananas are worse than a monoculture; they are actual clones. You don’t even have any intra-species variation.
schrodinger's cat
I am going to see Cumberbatch in Frankenstein, Live from National Theater tomorrow. Speshul birfday treat!
Anne Laurie
@schrodinger’s cat: Happy birfday, in advance! Enjoy the show!
Yam
Wait until a corn weevil hits the US.
mclaren
As others have pointed out, since all bananas are clones, this was inevitable at some point. The only real possibility for eliminating this kind of issue involves genetic engineering. And, alas, Democrats seem to be fanatically anti-GMO.
You can’t have it both ways. Either accept GMOs, or say goodbye to bananas.
Lurking Buffoon
@Barbara: My parents said similar things about just about just about all fruit when I was growing up. One way that you may theoretically find that old taste is to buy organic. After I came down with Crohn’s disease and figured out it was pesticides that were irritating it, the family made sure to have organic fruits and vegetables when I’d eat with them (while complaining about the cost, of course). First thing my parents said after having their first organic apple was that it tasted exactly like they remembered growing up.
Can’t help with the oreos though!
NotMax
Some banana facts and factoids.
Prairielogic
@mclaren… FYI… not exactly true about “all Dems being fanatically anti GMO”…. a solid endorsement this week and commitment to Ag biotechnology and science by President Obama in a letter to Norman Borlaug ‘s granddaughter:
http://www.agri-pulse.com/President-Obama-provides-clear-endorsement-of-agricultural-biotechnology-04152014.asp
“While I was running for President, your grandfather wrote to me about the importance of agricultural development. I share his belief that
investment in enhanced biotechnology is an essential component of the solution to some of our planet’s most pressing agricultural problems.
Through our new regional climate change hubs, we will use the sorts of technologies pioneered by your grandfather to help farmers and
ranchers face the climate challenges ahead. And I will continue to work with the Department of Agriculture and others to explore innovative
solutions to address food security challenges and mitigate the effects of climate change.”
“The agricultural community is indebted to your grandfather’s service, and our Nation will continue to engage in research and development in
support of his life’s mission to feed the world.”
Joel
@Francis: this is true of most tree fruits, if not all.
mclaren
By the way, bananas contain isotopic potassium that’s slightly radioactive. As a result, there’s a radiation dose known as a “banana equivalent dose.” (The radiation is so slight that there’s no meaningful cancer increase caused by eating bananas.)
Villago Delenda Est
@Mike in NC: Arrested Development reference ftw!
Villago Delenda Est
@mclaren: The main problem with GMO is not necessarily the modifications themselves, but the proprietary nature of them and the ravenous greed that propels the defense of that property. The patent system has been corrupted and warped, with the criminal cartel known as Monsanto in the lead.
Cermet
This may be due to the type (lack of genetic variety) of banana grown but this fungus may also be influenced or even primarily driven by higher global temperatures (making spread more easy.) Of course, could just be bad luck but smart money never believes in luck ,,, ,
tybee
bananas grow in coastal georgia. i have 4 cultivars. all four patches got knocked back to the ground by the 36 hours of below freezing temps in january but all are now growing stalks again. may have home grown bananas to eat by september.
the cultivars i have were developed by and at the UGA agricultural station The Bamboo Farm just south of savannah.
http://www.coastalgeorgiabg.org/
nancydarling
@Yam: Thousands of small corn farmers in Mexico were put out of business by cheap imports from the U.S. These small farmers grew a huge variety of corn. Our plant scientists tapped into that vast reservoir of genetic diversity when problems developed in our corn crops.
NAFTA was to corn as burning the library at Alexandria was to culture in the ancient world.
qwerty42
Add the possibility of losing OJ and other citrus crops: Citrus Greening.
humboldtblue
I hate bananas so it’s no loss for me on the food front, but it does make me smirk that this time around we can’t send in the Marines to ensure an exploitative corporation maintains its feudal position over powerless workers.
David Parsons
@mclaren: There’s a small subset of Democrats who are anti-GMO, but the choice isn’t only GMO or GTFO; monocultures are highly susceptable to this sort of thing, and the third choice is to diversify the devil out of banana production in the hopes that a third variant of Panama Disease can’t do what’s going to happen to the Cavendish for the third time.