LATIN AMERICA: The adored banana is facing a terrible threat from the intensifying climate crisis. According to a new report from Christian Aid, which was published by The Guardian, approximately two-thirds of banana-growing areas in Latin America and the Caribbean may become unfit for farming by 2080.
Nations like Colombia, Guatemala, and Costa Rica are now wrestling with diminishing harvests, aggravated by increasing temperatures, irregular rainfall, and increasingly extreme weather events.
Bananas are not only a well-known export; they’re also a vital source of nourishment, with over 400 million people dependent on them for up to 27% of their day-to-day calorie consumption. Yet, the very regions that yield 80% of the world’s exported bananas are the most susceptible to climate change, and are often the least accountable for the greenhouse gas discharges driving it.
Farmers on the frontlines
For small-scale growers all over Latin America, the effect is intensely personal. “Climate change has been killing our crops. This means there is no income because we cannot sell anything,” Aurelia Pop Xo, a 53-year-old banana planter from Guatemala, lamented. “What is happening is that my plantation has been dying. So, what has been happening is death.”
The Cavendish banana, the leading export variety, is principally endangered due to its inherent homogeneity. These bananas necessitate explicit growing environments — temperatures between 15°C and 35°C, stable water levels, and safety from hurricanes. But extreme climate events are making those settings tougher to sustain, leaving the crop unprotected to mutilation and disease.
Diseases thrive in a warmer world
As climate change fast-tracks, so does the spread of damaging plant diseases. Fungal pathogens such as black leaf fungus and Fusarium tropical race 4 are causing destruction on farmsteads. Black leaf fungus, which can diminish a banana plant’s capacity to photosynthesise by up to 80%, flourishes in increasingly common damp and tropical environments. In the meantime, the soil-borne Fusarium fungus is annihilating Cavendish banana grounds worldwide, with inadequate protection owing to the bananas’ lack of genetic diversity.
Christian Aid is appealing to the world’s richest and most contaminating countries to take instant action by winding up their dependence on fossil fuels and offer vital funding to impacted agricultural communities. “Bananas are not just the world’s favourite fruit, they are also an essential food for millions of people,” said Osai Ojigho, the organisation’s director of policy and campaigns. “We need to wake up to the danger posed by climate change to this vital crop. The lives and livelihoods of people who have done nothing to cause the climate crisis are already under threat.”