Yes! We have no bananas.
For years we’ve been slicing them, mashing them and baking them into lovely moist breads without a second thought, but our devil-may-care use of the humble banana might be about to change forever.
Scientists have warned that a worsening group of fungal diseases is threatening to wipe out the global banana supply completely in just five to ten years.
The destructive diseases (namely yellow sigatoka, eumusae leaf spot, and black sigatoka) all target the Cavendish banana, the very one we consume the most. Black sigatoka is known to destroy approximately 50 per cent of the Cavendish banana crop when it takes hold. The disease also reduces the quality of the fruit, causing premature ripening.
The banana is the world’s leading fruit crop and ranks fourth as a global staple food, so the problem reaches considerably further than a lack of smoothie ingredients in the western world.
It’s something researchers are working hard to fix before it’s too late.
“Black Sigatoka has a huge social, ecological and economic impact worldwide.” says banana expert Gert Kema, Professor in Tropical Phytopathology at Wageningen University.
“Thanks to the sequencing of the DNA of the Pseudocercospora fungus we are now gaining a greater insight into the interaction between the fungus and the banana plant.”
The team hope the insights will help them to develop a banana plant that is suitable for production and export, and which is also resistant against black Sigatoka.
Best freeze a few batches of banana bread while you still can…
That’s bananas:
