Our World

Can This Fruit Be Saved? - Banana Extinction

Today in class, the subject of Banana Extinction was brought up. We talked a little bit about how a fungus was affecting the types of bananas that we eat, and could soon cause them to become extinct. So scientists are working on ways to possibly genetically engineer bananas or alter them to become resistant to this fungus. It made me wonder; is all of the work being put into this worth it? I mean, really, how different could it be if bananas became extinct? Now I know about chain reactions of things like a food chain or something similar, but it's just bananas.

I was surprised to find quite a bit of information on this topic, and even more surprised as I read the articles at how urgent people made it sound. Now that I have read through some of it though, I can see why a lot of work is being applied to this struggle. At first I thought: Bananas go extinct, so what...we eat some other fruit. But the articles made me realize that there is much more to it than that. Americans eat more bananas than any other kind of fresh fruit, averaging about 26.2 pounds of them per year, per person. Yet here in the U.S., we would barely suffer compared to what people in places like Latin America would go through. In the developing world, the banana is the most important food in terms of production value after rice, wheat and maize. Over 80% of bananas stay in the country they are produced in. Not only would the country's economy suffer, many people who work on banana plantations would be out of a job.

Ironically, a situation similar to the one we are in now has happened before. Right now, a type of banana called the Cavendish is under attack from the fungal disease black Sigatoka. In the 1960s, a type of banana called the Gros Michel was killed by the Panama disease. The Gros Michel was the most common type of banana produced and eaten until it died. When it did, the Cavendish was there to replace it. Again I wondered: Then why is so much money being spent on trying to bioengineer bananas when we can just grow another type like we did before? It just doesn't work that easily. Right now, there are no types of bananas that are similar with the Cavendish. While reading the articles, I learned that there are many types of bananas, but they're all different in taste, texture, color, the rate at which they ripen, etc. It just wouldn't be the same without Cavendish bananas. Using pesticides or fungicides to try and control the diseases has helped somewhat, but like we also discussed in class, it is very expensive and has unhealthy side effects.

In conclusion, I have realized that the extinction of bananas would have an effect on people other than just excluding them from their diet. It would cause great harm to countries who produce bananas, people who work at banana plantations, the insects that eat bananas and the animals that eat them, and much more. I actually found this site interesting and it helped me understand why we need to concern ourselves with this issue, so check it out!

http://www.popsci.com/popsci/science/5a4d4c3ee4d05010vgnvcm1000004eecbccdrcrd.html

posted by Anonymous @ 9/19/2006 11:18:00 PM