Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
TheStandardFruitCompanyalsoinitiatedBordeauxsprayingopera-
tions during the mid-1930s. Company employees based in La Ceiba made
frequent visits to the Sula Valley in order to observe the control pro-
cedures adopted by the Tela Railroad Company. Standard Fruit, which
did not have a formal research department at the time, installed Bor-
deaux ground spray equipment similar to that developed by its larger
competitor. When the Sigatoka epidemic reached its farms, the company
was in the process of shifting its operations to the Upper Aguán valley
in the department of Yoro. The region received less rainfall than typi-
cally fell on the coastal plain in Atlántida. The comparatively arid climate
helped to limit the severity of Sigatoka outbreaks, but it also compelled
the company to irrigate heavily, an input that required significant invest-
ments of labor and capital.
49
The average area sprayed by Standard Fruit
workersincreasedsteadilybetween1938and1942,risingfrom730hectares
to more than 3,100 hectares. During this period, the company's annual
consumption of copper sulfate nearly quadrupled, from 525 tons to nearly
1,900 tons.
50
In a process very similar to what had taken place in the Sula valley,
Standard Fruit's adoption of capital- and labor-intensive Sigatoka control
measures marginalized small-scale banana producers without necessarily
dispossessingthemoftheirland.AsoneLaCeiba-basedU.S.consulnoted
in 1942, ''the company has been able to move, to irrigate, to spray and
to prop (to reduce wind damage), but the small farmers have not. They
stick to the railroad line along the rainycoast, solving only the problem of
transportation, and their yield per acre is small.''
51
Thereportestimated
that1,000poquiterosscatteredalongthecompany'srailroadannuallysold
around 500,000 bunches of fruit to the company. Both the low per-capita
production levels and the dwindling fraction of total exports that non-
companybananasrepresented(17percentofStandardFruit'stotalexports
in 1942) reflected the marginalized role played by poquiteros in the Siga-
toka era.
According to U.S. consul Wymberley Der Coerr, ''certain [Standard
Fruit] o
cials'' held the opinion that they should cease buying non-
company fruit because it was often rejected prior to shipping but after
the company had paid for them.
52
Not surprisingly, company o
cials fre-
quently described poquitero fruit as ''inferior'' in quality to that grown
onStandard'splantations.However,someStandardFruitmanagersadvo-
cated buying all independent fruit production ''for the sake of local wel-
fare and long-time political considerations.'' For forty years, the com-
pany had purchased bananas from small-scale farmers; no doubt some
