More farmers adopt new banana growing technology

By Ferdinand Mwongela

The hectarage under banana grown using tissue culture technology grew significantly last year.

The technology involves growing banana cultures in a laboratory until they are ready for transplant into the field.

Last year, demand for cultures outstripped supply from nurseries and laboratories. According to the an annual report by Africa Harvest, the number of farmers who benefited from the international biotechnology foundation tissue culture project almost double from 3,500 to 6,000.

Because of the highly controlled starter environment, the method significantly reduces disease and dramatically improves yield when coupled with good agronomic practices.

Despite this increase, however, the tissue culture bananas are yet to be totally free of viruses, says Africa Harvest Chief Executive Officer Florence Wambugu. She says the organisation is working closely with other partners to set up a virus indexing facility.

The commonly used practice of transferring banana suckers between farms increases the risk of transmitting pests and spreading disease among the banana crops.

The year also saw the organisation permitted to grow, Africa Bio fortified sorghum, in a green house in South Africa. The sorgum project seeks to create a highly nutritious bio-fortified crop that can grow in semi arid and arid areas in an effort to provide a long-term solution to malnutrition.

It was also a good year in the adoption of biotechnology crops across the world with two African countries, Egypt and Burkina Faso, joining countries growing biotechnology crops and bringing the number to 25 worldwide. It is projected that the global hectarage of biotech crops will rise by 9.4 per cent with about 40 countries expected to embrace the technology by 2015 including 10 in Africa.