Del Monte’s 865-acre Duacari plantation in Costa Rica. Mature banana trees produce a 60-pound bunch every eight months or so, which is harvested, loaded on an overhead cable system, and pulled into the nearby processing plant (left). The green fruit takes about ten days to travel by truck and refrigerated container ship to a port of entry, where it’s exposed to ethylene gas to start the ripening process. The large Cavendish variety is the king of bananas, accounting for virtually all bananas grown for export. But like most productive monocultures, it’s also highly susceptible to insects and disease, making it one of the most chemical intensive crops grown. To have perfect-looking fruit in the grocery aisle, the conventional banana farm uses copious amounts of pesticides and fungicides, with up to fifty-seven aerial applications a year, increasing the risk of exposure to banana workers and nearby villages.
