Bananas - Crop Post-Harvest: Science and Technology - page 24

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Bananas ( Musa spp.)

David W. Turner and Jeanie A. Fortescue

INTRODUCTION For human nutrition, bananas and plantains provide

carbohydrates, either as starch in plantain and cooking
bananas (Eggleston et al . 1992) or as sugars in dessert
bananas (von Loesecke 1949). They also supply miner-
als, particularly potassium (Wall 2006), and vitamins,
especially in populations for whom bananas and plan-
tains are more than 10% of their staple diet (Englberger
et al . 2003; Davey et al . 2006, 2007). Banana and
plantain fruit are available all year, although there is
variation in supply, often linked to weather conditions.
The fruit is usually harvested green and is transported to
market and ripened there. It is a perishable product and
is consumed within a few days to three weeks after
harvest. The perishable nature of bananas and plantains
means that losses between harvest and consumption can
be considerable. To determine the magnitude of losses is
difficult because it depends on the local situation and
the stage in the post-harvest system at which losses
occur (Wills et al . 1998). Nonetheless, the perishable
nature of the fruit and the distance from grower to market
have driven development of sophisticated systems of
post-harvest management (Hallam 1995) that are supported
by knowledge of the biology of the fruit and appropriate
technology.
In view of its commercial importance, a considerable
amount of research has been undertaken and many reviews
have been produced relating to the biology of the banana
and the technologies developed to handle the fruit. This
chapter concentrates on several areas of research where
our understanding of this fruit has recently advanced. For

Importance of bananas and plantains
Bananas (Figure 3.1) have had a long association with
humans and so people have been dealing with post-harvest
aspects of bananas going back at least 7000 years in
Papua New Guinea (Denham et al . 2003), more than 2500
years in Cameroon (Mindzie et al . 2001) and possibly
6000 years in Uganda (Lejju et al . 2006). Wild bananas
( Musa spp.) occur from India to Oceania, and the edible
clones are derived from hybrids of the wild species Musa
acuminata (A genome) and Musa balbisiana (B genome).
Among the edible bananas, the triploid groups AAA, AAB
and ABB are the most common. Plantains belong to the
AAB group. At present, bananas and plantains are major
sources of food in numerous countries in the tropics and
are available as fresh fruit throughout much of the world.
For gross value of production among world crops, bananas
and plantains rank fourth after rice, wheat and maize. Each
year about 105 million tonnes (Mt) are produced in the
tropics and subtropics. About 16 Mt enter international
trade that is dominated by AAA cultivars that are con-
sumed as fresh fruit (INIBAP 2006). The European Union
and the United States are the main importers of bananas,
and Ecuador is the main exporter, followed by Costa Rica
and the Philippines. Outside the international trade, India
produces about 16 Mt of bananas and plantains annually.
Uganda produces 10.5 Mt and Brazil 5.7 Mt. The annual
growth rate in world production of bananas and plantains
for the decade ending in 2002 was 3.3% (FAO 2006).