Scientists from 11 countries announced yesterday the founding of an international consortium to sequence the banana genome within five years.
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The scientists from governmental, university and non-profit organisations will use the new genetic data to enable farmers worldwide to grow bananas that are able to resist the fungus Black Sigatoka, as well as other diseases and pests.
Of the 95m tonnes of bananas grown worldwide annually, approximately one-third is produced in each of Latin America, Africa and Asia. Some 85% of the global crop is produced for home consumption and local trade, largely without the use of pesticides, leaving them highly susceptible to disease.
The 15% of the global banana crop grown for export meanwhile relies heavily on chemical inputs, according to Future Harvest, a non-profit organisation that supports food and environmental research for rural communities in the developing world.
For the past three decades, the spread of the Black Sigatoka fungus has been undermining banana production, reaching almost every banana-growing region in the world and reducing yields by 30% to 50%.
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By GlobalDataOrganisations from Australia, Belgium, Brazil, the Czech republic, France, Germany, India, Mexico, the UK and the US joined the international project, led by the International Network for the Improvement of Banana and Plantain (INIBAP), in a programme developed by the Rome-based International Plant Genetic Resources Institute (IPGRI). Both are Future Harvest centres.
“Banana will be the first exclusively tropical crop to be sequenced. More than a popular snack, bananas are a staple food that many African families eat for every meal. This is our chance to develop a crop that won’t fail them and that may help lift them out of hunger and poverty,” said Dr Emile Frison, director of the Montpellier, France-based INIBAP.
By Aaron Priel, just-food.com Correspondent
