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Bananas on the road to extinction

Posted Dec 28, 2006 at 11:44PM by Rio S. Listed in: Plants and Agriculture Tags: Taiwan, Australia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Asia
Ó

say it ain't so


The banana as we know it is in danger. Scientists are worried about the world's fave fruit.

The banana is the most popular fresh fruit in the U.S., consumed at about 26.2 pounds per year per person. The best known kind of banana is the Cavendish. Every Cavendish is a genetic duplicate of any Cavendish around the world. It was first discovered in Southeast Asia then brought to a botanical garden in the Carribean.

The quality that makes the banana perfect for worldwide consumption, perfect banana clones, may also be it's downfall. Species rely on genetic diversity for survival, so what makes one person sick may not affect another person. Since bananas are all genetic twins, a fungus or a bacterial disease can wipe out an entire plantation then spread around the globe and infect all the plantations.

A banana catastrophe? Rabbids would run out of ammo. But seriously speaking though, it's happened before. The Gros Michel type, nicknamed "Big Mike" used to be the most popular kind imported and exported. It was wiped out by a fungus named the Panama disease. The Cavendish was then accepted as the replacement, since it was immune to the Panama disease.

Now, a new strain of the fungus was discovered in Southeast Asia and wreaked havoc in Indonesia, Malaysia, Australia, and Taiwan. It is still making its way to the rest of the Southeast. Experts are racing against time to find a way to prevent another global wipeout and the subsequent shortage. Some scientists estimate that the Cavendish only has five to ten years left. They are trying genetic splicing but if the fungus spreads faster than expected, finding an alternative banana species would be the best choice.

Or switch to apples.

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1 Comments


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   by Me (Unregistered) - 2006-12-30
 » ??????
This is very very very old news.
I read this exact paragraph like 2 years ago for a science fair project...



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