Bananas #2- "Growing bananas socially sustainable, ethically, environmentally and sometimes even organically"

Since the demand for organic bananas have increased over 50% per year in the US and Europe in the past couple of years Costa Rica is having to figure out how to grow more and more organic bananas a year.  According to newfarm.org, "Black Sigatoka fungus disease, Mycosphaerella fijiensis, and the toppling nematode, Radopholus similis, are the biggest organic banana production problems."  Organic bananas are often grown in areas that have not had bananas grown in them before.  One way that a banana producer can fight against Black Sigatoka is by cutting away dying leaves, covering the racemes with bags to speed growth and prevent damage from birds, keeping the topsoil clean, and removing the flowers from the bunches.  

A program known as the Rainforest Alliance Better Banana Program is a movement to help conventionally grow bananas for environmental and social sustainability.  The certification process for the RABBP is an intense process that involves practices that protect water quality, worker health and safety, and wildlife habitat.  There are nine principles that the RABBP take into consideration when deciding whether or not the farms are certified or not, and they are "ecosystem conservation, wildlife conservation, fair treatment and good conditions for workers, good community relations, strictly managed use of agrichemicals, integrated management of waste, conservation of water resources, soil conservation, and environmental planning and monitoring" according to socialfunds.com.  Also, according to socialfunds.com these companies have a win-win-win model: "a win for the environment, a win for workers, and a win for corporations."  One large corporation that is partnered with RABBP is Chiquita.   

The RABBP are mostly used by corporate banana such as Chiquita.  The US is two thirds of Chiquita's bananas sold, which all of the plantations that they come from are certified under the RABBP.  This means that all 127 of Chiquita's farms in Latin America are certified under the nine principles of RABBP.