We don't eat bananas anymore in our house, largely for the reasons outlined in the article.
The thumbnail summary: bananas only started being widely consumed in the 1960s because of heavy marketing efforts by Central American railroad builders (they had to do something with the land along the sides of the newly built railroads, and bananas happened to fit).
They are heavily chemically treated, more than any other fruit. They've been a monoculture almost since Day 1.
Oh, another fun fact, those little stickers on bananas? They were one of the first examples of 'branding'
I didn't find this article all that well written or informative. I recommend Chapman's Bananas: How the United Fruit Company Shaped the World
I also happened to read John McPhee's Oranges at the same time. The contrast between the orange (an ancient fruit, widely consumed, hardy, with a rich literary tradition) and the banana is stark.
Both books, by the way, are great little studies in technology business. Techno-optimism, marketing, PR, globalization, manic CEOs; it's all there.
The thumbnail summary: bananas only started being widely consumed in the 1960s because of heavy marketing efforts by Central American railroad builders (they had to do something with the land along the sides of the newly built railroads, and bananas happened to fit).
They are heavily chemically treated, more than any other fruit. They've been a monoculture almost since Day 1.
Oh, another fun fact, those little stickers on bananas? They were one of the first examples of 'branding'
I didn't find this article all that well written or informative. I recommend Chapman's Bananas: How the United Fruit Company Shaped the World
I also happened to read John McPhee's Oranges at the same time. The contrast between the orange (an ancient fruit, widely consumed, hardy, with a rich literary tradition) and the banana is stark.
Both books, by the way, are great little studies in technology business. Techno-optimism, marketing, PR, globalization, manic CEOs; it's all there.