Bye Bye Bananas — the Return of Panama Disease

Ant sends in a disturbing report in The Scientist on an imminent threat to worldwide banana production. "The banana we eat today is not the one your grandparents ate. That one — known as the Gros Michel — was, by all accounts, bigger, tastier, and hardier than the variety we know and love, which is called the Cavendish. The unavailability of the Gros Michel is easily explained: it is virtually extinct. Introduced to our hemisphere in the late 19th century, the Gros Michel was almost immediately hit by a blight that wiped it out by 1960. The Cavendish was adopted at the last minute by the big banana companies — Chiquita and Dole — because it was resistant to that blight, a fungus known as Panama disease... [Now] Panama disease — or Fusarium wilt of banana — is back, and the Cavendish does not appear to be safe from this new strain, which appeared two decades ago in Malaysia, spread slowly at first, but is now moving at a geometrically quicker pace. There is no cure, and nearly every banana scientist says that though Panama disease has yet to hit the banana crops of Latin America, which feed our hemisphere, the question is not if this will happen, but when. Even worse, the malady has the potential to spread to dozens of other banana varieties, including African bananas, the primary source of nutrition for millions..."

Look on the bright side of...

[zAPPzAPP (1207370)]

Will this finally be the end of "Peanut Butter Jelly Time"?

Re:Look on the bright side of...

[0100010001010011 (652467)]

First hit on google [youtube.com]

Meme that went around the internet 4-5 years ago.

monoculture is a problem

[circletimessquare (444983)]

but it is also solved by genetic variation. the story is a little hysterical, as african varieties are also genetically different enough to resist the new cavendish-hungry fungus. not that the african varieties can't be attacked, but the emphasis is on african VARIETIES: more genetic variation means more resistance to the weakness of monoculture

Re:monoculture is a problem

[onion2k (203094)]

The problem is that all banana plants around today are sterile. The only way to cultivate new plants is by cuttings (taking a small section of an existing plant and growing it into a big plant). Consequently there is no way to introduce new variations. If all the varieties around today become susceptible to disease then that's it, they're gone. For those of us in the west that's just one less choice in the supermarket, but there are vast swathes of the world where the banana is the staple carbohydrate source for millions of people. It'd be like the west no longer having anything to make flour for bread, and having no alternative. Anyone who thinks this isn't a huge problem is wrong.

Re:monoculture is a problem

[tehdaemon (753808)]

They are not all quite sterile... you do get a seed for every few hundred pounds of bananas.

That said, you are essentially right. All cavendish bananas are clones, this makes them very vulnerable to disease.

T

Re:monoculture is a problem

[nospam007 (722110)]

That said, you are essentially right. All cavendish bananas are clones, this makes them very vulnerable to disease.

and they taste like wet paper bags. I haven't eaten a Chiquita in over 10 years, I prefer any other which at least taste like a banana. Chiquitas were only bred for looks.

Re:monoculture is a problem

[BlackCreek (1004083)]

And here is why I *never* *ever* buy Chiquita (new name for United Fruit Company) products: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Fruit_Company [wikipedia.org]

I find it funny how the wikipedia article on Chiquita just mentions the name change but none of the history it was meant to hide http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chiquita_Brands_International [wikipedia.org]

At least now you slashdotters know how the expression banana republic http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_republic [wikipedia.org] came to be. A republic that a criminal banana company would be capable of destroying.

Re:monoculture is a problem

[Arccot (1115809)]

And here is why I *never* *ever* buy Chiquita (new name for United Fruit Company) products: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Fruit_Company [wikipedia.org]

I can't understand this sort of thinking. Sure, if the company did this within the last 10 or maybe even 20 years, I would understand a boycott. But it happened almost 80 years ago. It's not the same company now. I would be surprised if more than a couple of people working for the company at the time were even still alive.

It's like boycotting Japanese products because of Pearl Harbor.

Re:monoculture is a problem

[BlackCreek (1004083)]

You have a valid point.

It is hard to compare such distinct events. But I would say that the damage caused by Pearl Harbor was "contained", and later "repaired". The US did not suffer that much from that war, and Japan was given conditions to rebuild.

Pearl Harbor did not destroy the US democracy.

The damage caused by the United Fruit Company, to that region (Central America) stability, to those countries democracies is still an issue to this day.

The land that many of those countries tried to nationalize, and died for trying it, is still in the hands of the "United Fruit Company". Now renamed "Chiquita".

The grandchildren of those who died in the 50s, 60s for it, are still workers in that same land, and did not become land-owners.

Those sitting at Chiquita today did not cause the offense. But they still make profits out of it, and the mess caused by that offense perpetuates to this day.

Re:monoculture is a problem

[Sockatume (732728)]

Actually, New Scientist did a story about this, maybe five years ago, which was worried about the bananas' genetic variation, but didn't have any specific threat attached. They pointed out that although the current banana plants is pretty hardy, they're cultivated by cloning, so there's very little capacity for adaptation there. I forget the details of the story, but it was something like "there may not be any bananas as we know them in 25 years". Now the threat actually exists...

Re:monoculture is a problem

[by Anonymous Coward]

Yes, monoculture is a HUGE problem.

At the moment I'm working in the bio/ag-tech industry and can see the same thing coming down the road in the wheat/corn/soybeans/milo industry, where big industry players have foolishly limited the gene pool in the name of profit.

The worst part about it is the fact that many of the people driving monoculture are trained scientists who, for some reason, are oblivious to its negative ramifications.

Posting as AC to avoid other, uh, negative ramifications

There are many kinds of bananas

[mangu (126918)]

more genetic variation means more resistance to the weakness of monoculture

I live in Brazil where there are many types of bananas available. Any supermarket has at least three different types. Just off my head, I can name at least six types of Brazilian bananas: Ouro ("gold"), Prata ("silver"), d'Agua ("water"), Maçã ("apple"), Nanica ("dwarf"), da Terra ("earth").

Re:There are many kinds of bananas

[beadfulthings (975812)]

Somebody with points should mod your post up as "interesting." I lived in the Far East when I was a child and remember the same thing--at least three readily available bananas with different characteristics--one yellow, one that was green in color even when ripe, and one that was reddish, kind of small, and intensely sweet.

Re:monoculture is a problem

[c6gunner (950153)]

And what do you think will happen when all rich countries will buy bananas from africa?

For the most part, they (we?) won't. Most varieties of Banana's are rather small and nasty. They're not the kind of thing your average westerner is likely to enjoy.

On the other hand, assuming they can find a variety of Banana which is easy to cultivate, resistant to this disease, AND tasty, then it'll be a huge boon to their economy. It could do more good for Africa than all the foreign aid of the last three decades combined.

Re:monoculture is a problem

[aproposofwhat (1019098)]

that's "seem's", you insensitive clod!

Re:monoculture is a problem

[vidarh (309115)]

Go to your local African food store and ask for Plaintain. Eat it (note that Plaintains are usually cooked first). Now you see why this is not going to be a problem.

Being married to an African woman (Nigerian to be precise), I've had the misfortune of tasting Plaintain, and while I don't mind most of her food (it's usually either too bland and uniformely textured or too spicy for me, but generally edible), with Plaintain I see no redeemable qualities.

It's a very acquired taste, as a lot of African staple food, and it's certainly no replacement for the types of Banana exported to the west.

Re:monoculture is a problem

[vorpal^ (114901)]

Then you've only had plantains one of the two ways in which they're eaten. I agree that green plantains aren't my cup of tea. In my opinion they're like overly firm and starchy potatoes with a hint of banana flavouring to them. After a week of traveling Panama, I never wanted to see them again.

However, if you let plantains ripen until they're black (at which point, they're still perfectly edible, unlike bananas) and then peel them, cut them into long slices, and cook them in butter, they're incredibly sweet and delicate.

More in line with the original post, there are several varieties of bananas that I find much more delicious than the Cavendish variety. I've had the pleasure of eating several other varieties while abroad that I really enjoyed; for example, apple bananas have got a firmer, more flavourful meat to them, and I strongly prefer them to Cavendish. Cavendish bananas, although I love them, can be a bit dull tasting and mushy.

300 Species, Probably Not All Susceptible

[FurtiveGlancer (1274746)]

According to Banana.com [banana.com] there are over 300 different species of bananas, not all edible. I'm fairly certain that not all the edible species will be susceptibe to the blight. This might actually be a good thing in the long run as different species have different flavors and textures. They may even be better for us from a nutritional perspective than the Cavendish. The growers will need to adapt if the blight can't be stopped or contained.

Re:300 Species, Probably Not All Susceptible

[Lumpy (12016)]

And that is the key to this.

The Cavendish is actually a very inferior banana. It's simply tougher and cheap to transport compared to the other varieties. the Banana companies are panicking because they will have to change how they do business and they dont want to.

Honestly, if you can get to try some of the other bananas out there, you'll never EVER touch the bland yucky Cavendish again. The growers brought this on themselves, the same way the last blight took out the favorite that was EVEN easier to ship and transport but had the advantage of tasting way better than the current offering.

Re:300 Species, Probably Not All Susceptible

[0100010001010011 (652467)]

In other news, there's a Banana.com.

Seriously people?

[Netochka (874088)]

This story pops up every 6 months or so (I guess not here, but in general)... Has no one else heard about this banana scare story about 10 times before?? There's even a snopes article about it. Banana Extinction [snopes.com]

Re:Seriously people?

[forgotten_my_nick (802929)]

Your correct. But the US Media is running out of things to scare the people about.

The article is less to do on bananas going extinct then rather trying to sell GM crops to the public.

Re:Seriously people?

[Richard W.M. Jones (591125)]

but the only one eaten by americans is the cavendish

When I was in Bali I ate several different varieties of banana, and they were all much more tasty than the "bog-standard" Cavendish. So maybe this isn't such a bad thing after all.

Rich.

Re:Seriously people?

[datapharmer (1099455)]

bananas are supposed to be picked green. they get woody (tough with bitter flavor) if left on the tree to ripen. To get them to be sweeter the blossom is cut off after an incomplete row of banana hands is made which concentrates the growth into the existing bananas instead of attempts to make more.

Read more carefully

[Moraelin (679338)]

Snopes basically said the exact same thing. The cavendish bananna will be extinct. Snopes is playing semantics by saying that all bananas won't be effected, but the only one eaten by americans is the cavendish, so yes, the bananna as we know it will be extinct. Just like the bananna your grandparents knew is already extinct.

Read more carefully. There's more than that in there.

The fungus discussed here grows in the earth, and spreads through earth. In fact, it is a problem _because_ it's in the ground, so you can't just spray the leaves with some fungicide.

So the only way this fungus could make the jump across the ocean to Latin America is either by

A) someone bringing an infected plant and planting it in the middle of a plantation, or

B) someone bringing a sack of infected earth and dumping it in a plantation. That's it, really.

And the cultivars _are_ aware of the threat, so they:

A) don't import any plants, but only clone plants which are known to be healthy. (They actually check, yes.) And

B) don't import soil from anywhere. And apparently the countries which depend on bananas for their economy, have special customs regulations to forbid exactly that.

Just about the only realistic scenario I can think of where that jump could happen, is, basically, an act of terror or sabotage. I.e., someone deliberately bringing some infected soil and spreading it around in Latin America. It could happen, I guess, but it's hardly something that the cultivars can do much about in advance.

At any rate, that's the failure point of the "OMG, it's spreading exponentially" scare. It can spread all it want somewhere else, as long as it can't cross the ocean by itself, it's even less of a threat to the Latin American plantation than Al Qaeda deciding to crash an airplane into a plantation.

Re:Read more carefully

[IkeTo (27776)]

> So the only way this fungus could make the jump across the ocean to Latin America is either by

> A) someone bringing an infected plant and planting it in the middle of a plantation, or

> B) someone bringing a sack of infected earth and dumping it in a plantation. That's it, really.

I think it is much easier than that. The fungus spread by insects like aphid. All it takes is a single one left alone in a container to somehow land in anywhere close to plantation to begin the spread of the disease.

Re:Read more carefully

[God'sDuck (837829)]

Or a bit of dirt in somebody's shoe after travelling, or on an imported potato, or...

Easier done than said.

Hmm.

[ledow (319597)]

Single, cloned fruit, unable to reproduce except by human intervention, with identical genetic structure in virtually all examples, cloned and distributed worldwide for decades is susceptible to the same attacking fungus that attacked the previous single, cloned fruit with identical genetic structure, but which has mutated slightly (my conjecture) in order to attack it's replacement.

And all because people don't like seeds in their fruit? (I would guess this isn't true, most probably people wouldn't really care much anyway, given that the fruit has an inedible skin too and a lot of popular fruits have seeds).

It's hardly surprising, it's only "catastrophic" because we've deliberately propogated a single, genetically-identical (and I would hazard "faulty", due to it's inability to reproduce) plant over and over and over again.

Re:Hmm.

[Cairnarvon (901868)]

One word: http://cairnarvon.rotahall.org/pics/wildbanana.jpg [rotahall.org]

There's a reason modern bananas have been bred to be seedless.

One word?

[RossumsChild (941873)]

Technically, that was worth a thousand words.

Re:One word?

[tgd (2822)]

Technically that was worth 18526 words, 37052 bytes, 74104 nybbles, or 296416 bits.

Will someone...

[draxredd (661953)]

think of the monkeys !

Higher friction on the Gros Michel?

[DingerX (847589)]

So, was granpa's banana more slippery? 'Cos that would explain their widespread use as comic devices in the pre-television era. (And, no, I never thought about asking Grandma about Granpa's banana, codenamed "Big Mike." Pervert.)

Re:Higher friction on the Gros Michel?

[ThreeGigs (239452)]

So, was granpa's banana more slippery?
Actually, that's a slightly hedged 'yes'.
Grampa's banana had a thicker, more durable skin, in addition to being larger than the bananas we youngun's know so well.
The other reason it's so popular as comic relief is because it actually was a real hazard back around 1915-ish. As a 'portable' fruit, they were handy to carry anywhere, and without streetcorner trash cans, the peels got tossed on the sidewalk as often as not. And considering bananas are (and were) the most popular fruit in the US (almost twice as popular as the good ol' apple), it really was a normal hazard. The Boy Scout handbook of 1914 actually listed removing a banana peel from the sidewalk as a 'good deed', it was that common an occurence.

As a side effect though, it *did* start many cities putting trash cans on busy streets, and enacting littering laws.

RTFA... There's actually more to it!

[stormguard2099 (1177733)]

I know it's against the rules but if you RTFA the interesting part isn't about the blight spreading through the bananas. As others have posted this is not something that sprang up over night, it's been coming for quite a while now.

The truly interesting part is that the banana companies in S. America still don't see this as a problem. TFA says that in their anual summaries they don't even mention this disease much less list it as a threat. I think the issue is much more about these companies' failure to act before it's too late than that nature is running its course.

Finally we may get some variety ...

[Big Jojo (50231)]

Having traveled in some tropical countries, one of the things I most remember about their fruits are the sheer NUMBER of different banana varieties. No monoculture. Your average roadside stand would have half a dozen varieties, and the one a mile down the road would have a few more. Tomorrow the mix would be different. And most of them would taste a lot better than the crap that's so widely available elsewhere!

I for one will welcome our new polycultural bananalords.

There's one problem

[Siener (139990)]

Unfortunately none of those dozens of varieties have the attributes that make the Cavendish banana by far the most successful and important fruit crop in the world:

1. Long shelf life
2. Very uniform and predictable ripening times

That is why you can get bananas cheaply, even though they might be grown thousands of miles from where they are eventually sold.

Most, if not all the other varieties are only viable crops when they are sold very close to where they were grown.

Re:Finally we may get some variety ...

[Moridineas (213502)]

As a side note, I do think the tendency for westerners to buy bananas out of habit is a disease.

Why is it a disease? I like bananas. Why should I not eat bananas? I understand that you want everyone to live according to your standards and morality, but really, why should I not eat bananas?

People have written essays and even books on why fruits and vetegables should be bought local, and then, only when in season. The idea of eating summer fruits when there's snow on the ground might be novel, but hardly appropriate, or interesting.

This is absolutely bonkers. My wife's family lives in Wisconsin. You want them to survive on local produce over the winter? You want them to hoard dry goods so they can eat 6 months out of the year? Not to mention the exciting selection of nutritional deficits that most of the world suffered from before cheap year round fresh food selections. Really, this type of judgmental viewpoint bothers me so much. I really see your "EAT THIS WAY OR YOU HAVE A DISEASE!" moralism as no different from right wingers who think homosexuality is a disease.

Conversely, seeing a California supermarket in the middle of summer selling bananas (and their customers lining up to buy them) when just about every type of fruit is ripe for the picking is, well, no less than absurd.

Are you just making this up as you go along? Watching people "line up" for bananas in a supermarket? Food scarcity hasn't exactly been a problem in America in a number of years, I would be very interested in where you've seen people "line up" to get bananas, while bypassing all other fruits.

Me, I typically shop at farmer's markets,

Good for you! We should all be more like you, thanks for holding yourself out there as an example of the Right Way to live!

What will happen to the dancing banana?

[antifoidulus (807088)]

What other animated emoticon can I use to signal that I have an erection?

Gros Michel?

[lysse (516445)]

Is anyone else wondering what exactly it was about this Big Michael guy that caused someone to name a large and tasty banana after him...?

I just couldnt help it...

[denton420 (1235028)]

"There is no cure, and nearly every banana scientist says..."

Anyone else burst out laughing after reading the title of banana scientist? This picture came to mind...

http://www.zenbutoh.com/charactergallery/images/gorilla-bananas.jpg [zenbutoh.com]

Bananas the World's 4th Largest Staple Crop

[Starky (236203)]

While this might not seem so serious to consumers in the U.S., in fact the banana family (including plantains) is the 4th largest food staple crop in the world (or at least it was several years ago when I was researching the banana industry for a litigation matter) behind wheat, rice, and corn.

Food for thought.

Re:Oh noes!

[lordofthechia (598872)]

Slow news day? I think any story about a major threat to our food supply to be a major one, plus it mentions "Banana Scientists"! What is there not to love?

Re:Oh noes!

[aliquis (678370)]

Exactly, how does extinction / loss of a food supply / mutating desease which have earlier almost killed a whole industry become small news? I would more likely find it the biggest news this day on Slashdot, time will tell.

I guess he just don't eat bananas.

Re:Oh noes!

[Lumpy (12016)]

Why? because this news is OVER 3 months old. I heard it on NPR "science friday" back in Late April early May! it has been covered heavily in all the earth science and microbiological journals for nearly 3 months now and yes those have covered how it's spreading even faster.

It's like Slashdot waiting until the end of the month to announce, "Mars polar lander made it to the ground and is sending pictures!"

So yes, it's a slow news day as it's a rehash of old news that has had wide coverage.

Next up, The MIR space station is going to be decommissioned, and spacelab will fall from the sky.

Re:Oh noes!

[zifferent (656342)]

It's older than that. I read about it in a magazine years ago. The smallish bananas that you see in the supermarket are part of an aggressive breeding program to get ahead of the disease.

The truth is banana plants haven't been propagated by seed, and only recently (past five years) have there been attempts to find new cultivars, before the bottom falls out of the banana industry.

Re:Oh noes!

[JosKarith (757063)]

... which would be preferable to bananas falling out of your bottom I suppose...

Re:Oh noes!

[DarenN (411219)]

Well, first of all, here's an article from 2003 [bbc.co.uk] that looks like it might have been on the money [oup.com]

Second of all, most banana plants are grown from cuttings - without the reproduction mutations resistant to these fungal infections are simply not happening on any kind of scale. "The problem is that the banana we eat is a seedless, sterile article which could slip the way of its predecessor which was wiped out by blight half a century ago."

They're sequencing the genome of the bananas eaten in africa (which HAVE seeds) but there are problems because people aren't interested in the GM varieties, saying they taste more like apple (no bad thing to me)

Re:Oh noes!

[MrAngryForNoReason (711935)]

But while I disagree about this being a major threat to our food supply (I think we should be fine even without bananas)

If you RTFS then you will see that while 'we' in developed countries will be ok without bananas they make up a large part of the food supply for some people in Africa. This will likely have a massive effect on people who don't have the luxury to choose what they eat day to day.

Re:Fruit considered dangerous

[midnighttoadstool (703941)]

Meat and saturated fat were linked to heart disease which is now considered non-causative: contributory only. Only highly processed meats are still linked to cancers. Red meat is linked to male infertility but only because of beef hormone usage.

Salmonella infects 1 in 20,000 eggs, and generally only if the shell is cracked. For years it was supposed to cause heart disease, onyl for the WHO to establish that the more you eat the longer you live.

Margarine was supposed to be heart healthy and turned out to be the opposite.

Same with vegetable oils, but which cause cancer in lab animals (triggering an attempt to industrially convert polyunsaturates to monounsaturated oils).

I reckon there are two general rules: when is doubt do the opposite of what the experts tell you, and the second to establish what is anthropologically natural to us rather than chasing novel elixirs. After all, you can't be moderate or balanced with poisons (like margarine, a sort of plasticised oil).