Fresh Focus Banana 2021

Page 31

ANALYSIS Publication Sponsor

Prices must include real costs The argument between producers and distributors concerning banana prices is not about to go away.

ALISTAIR SMITH Banana Link International coordinator

G

rowers are insisting, rightly, that if the market wants living wages, decent contracts and working conditions, as well as positive environmental impacts at the production end, then this has

to be reflected in prices that cover the costs, with a margin for investment in what buyers and consumers actually want. “Shared responsibility” is the watchword; and bananas can no longer be treated as a loss leader whose buying price can be infinitely squeezed. The TR4 threat hanging over the whole industry is just one symptom of a production system that has reached its limits. New varieties and diversified agroecological methods are not a utopian luxury, but

– but also to what can be done to put the industry on a

need to be explored as a way out of multiple crises that

different track.

affect all those whose livelihoods depend on the trade. Growers are now presenting a united front, and

It is finally emerging from the scientific community that the only solutions to managing the TR4 disease

this is encouraging. The exporting countries and their

probably lie in soil management, feeding soils

producers could take measures to control supply, but

biologically rather than chemically. But

buyers urgently need to play their part and understand

the investment that is required to

that all the economic, social and environmental issues

make the transition on a large scale

affecting the industry are interlinked. Trying to resolve

can only be made if the industry

one set of issues without seeing the whole picture will

makes a united effort.

not lead to sustainable bananas for all. Keeping buying

Many banana scientists are

prices down is ultimately the surest way of causing the

ready to support a transition. Many

collapse of the whole industry.

banana companies see the writing

Consumers in many countries have led the way in

1 in 8

bananas sold in north america last year were organic

on the wall for the conventional

giving the banana sector the biggest Fairtrade market

Cavendish monoculture, even if they are

share in Europe with around 10 per cent, and a rapidly

not comfortable saying so publicly. Many workers

growing organic share. Nearly one in eight bananas

are ready to contribute to these efforts on a daily basis

sold in North America last year were organic, for

if producers accept that they cannot go it alone without

example. This should be a signal to the big buyers that

the participation of their workforce.

they can go further, as we are no longer talking about market ‘niches’ for organic and Fairtrade. For years, Banana Link has sought to alert key

The question is no longer whether to act or what to do, but rather how and when. The World Banana Forum provides the space to work this out. The price of not

players and consumers not only to what is wrong – and

heeding all the signals would be much higher than

all the negative impacts of the current banana system

investing in genuinely sustainable bananas. _

ABOVE—The

threat of TR4 hangs over the whole industry

fresh focus banana 2021

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18/05/2021 16:58


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