Agriculture and Environment: Commodities

Overview: Bananas (Musa acuminata and M.x paradisiaca)

Bananas were among the first fresh tropical fruits to be mass-marketed worldwide, competing with local fruits.

A major advantage of bananas in the marketplace is that they can be produced year-round; bananas are not seasonal like many other fruits. Historically, bananas were primarily a subsistence food crop.

Most popular fruit in UK in 1905!
By the end of the nineteenth century, they started being produced for export and showing up as expensive foods in international markets. Davies (1990) reported that in 1905 bananas had become the most popular fruit in the United Kingdom, ahead of oranges, apples, or tomatoes.

Symbol of global free trade
Market penetration has continued throughout the past century so that today bananas are considered a staple rather than a luxury food item. With the breakup of the former USSR and its allies, bananas were imported and became widely available in those formerly closed markets for the first time ever. This made bananas the symbol of open international commerce.

The biggest producers do not export
Bananas are and have always been a basic foodstuff in tropical countries. To this day the two largest banana producers do not export any bananas, and globally nearly 80% of all bananas are consumed in their country of origin.

Most bananas are produced in backyards or small plantings and are sold into local or regional markets in the producing country. The environmental impacts of this type of production are minimal.

Most bananas produced for export are grown in large, monocrop plantations. It is in these production systems that most of the environmental problems arise.