First Dutch bananas could seriously help tackle worldwide fungal threat

A Dutch university will continue to expand the Netherlands’ first crop of bananas together with an analysis programme which may shield the fruit coming from a deadly fungus that threatens production worldwide.

Wageningen University grew 60 banana plants included in the greenhouses on coco peat and rock wool, avoiding the threat of an soil-borne fungal illness that could destroy large numbers of hectares of banana plants around the globe, local media reported. The crop is going to be agreed to local hospitals and restaurants.

Gert Kema, a professor of tropical plant pathology, said the success would result in further research into combating Fusarium wilt.

“It threatens banana production around the world,” Kema said. “So we took the banana away from the soil. The plants grow effectively, with simply the employment of a nutrient.”

Bananas really are a staple food in excess of 400 million individuals the tropics, good university.The Fusarium fungus contaminates soil for many years and can’t be suppressed, which is threatening banana production throughout south-east Asia.

Growing bananas in a artificial medium provides the nutrients the plants receive being tailored as outlined by their requirements, and cuts down on nutrient losses through leakage, Kema told the university’s website.

“The Dutch banana also doesn’t need disease control, that produces cultivation more sustainable compared with traditional production areas,” he was quoted saying. Under this sort of “precision cultivation”, the plants can also be separated out way more that each gets more light, allowing individual bunches of bananas to ripen faster.

Several local companies and the Swiss-owned banana producer and distributor Chiquita are looking into expanding the studies programme, and also a trial using artificial substrates is planned inside the Philippines.

This information was amended on 15 December 2018 to alter the spelling of Chiquita.