Banana prices to go up as global temperature increases

Top experts say that bananas are likely to become more expensive as climate change and increased temperatures affect supply chains.

Bad news for banana lovers this week.

Pascal Liu, senior economist at the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation, has said that climate change is an ‘enormous threat’ to banana supplies. It will also intensify problems caused by fast-spreading diseases and fruit availability.

The World Banana Forum is to meet next week to discuss the problem and consider potential solutions.

Just last week, the UK experienced a brief outage of bananas due to sea storms. The fruit is particularly popular there, with over 5 billion imported every year and 90% sold through major supermarkets like Tesco, Sainsburys, Morrisons, and Aldi.

What’s causing the problem specifically? Bananas are sensitive to temperature rises more than other produce, which means that crops could be wiped out in areas that become too hot over the next few decades.

A warmer world also means a faster spread of diseases. One causing particular concern currently is Fusarium Wilt TR4, a fungal infection. It has moved from Australia and Asia to Africa. It is now in South America. Once a plantation becomes infected, all banana trees are killed and experts say it’s very hard to get rid of permanently.