Going Bananas

As an adjective, banana describes a bicycle seat, a slug, a type of country, and a favorite ice cream dessert. It's the most popular fruit in the world and the fourth most important food crop after rice, wheat, and maize.

With a history tied to colonial exploitation, union busting, presidential influence peddling, and environmental degradation, it's obvious the banana is much more than a topping for breakfast cereal or a nutritious snack food. The banana has been at the center of a controversial World Trade Organization ruling and just last month the world's top banana producer (Chiquita Brands International) appeared to teeter on the brink of bankruptcy even as it filed a half-billion dollar lawsuit against the European Union.

Bananas are the most important export fruit around the globe, a market worth nearly $5 billion a year. Most of these 14 million tons of bananas come from Latin America, where in the past they were produced on giant plantations without care for people or the environment. A lack of social security, dangers from at least eight poisonous pesticides, and the violence of plantation owners against union activists were part of the daily routine on banana plantations.

Three US transnational corporations dominate world trade in bananas. The largest producer and distributor is Chiquita, followed closely by Dole Foods and Del Monte. Between them they produce and control up to 70 percent of world exports.

Lately, the trio has been polishing their corporate images. First, Fresh Del Monte Produce Inc. announced in January 1999 that its Costa Rican banana operations had received the ISO 14001 environmental management systems certificates from Bureau Veritas Quality International (BVQI). According to a report in Ethical Consumer, during 1997 in Costa Rica, half of all work-related accidents occurred on banana plantations -- mostly due to pesticide poisoning.

"Environmental stewardship is extremely important to us, and we feel strongly about environmental responsibility, especially in the fresh produce industry," said Mohammad Abu-Ghazaleh, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Fresh Del Monte. "This accomplishment is only the beginning of Fresh Del Monte's efforts to build world class environment, social, and quality management system throughout its operations."

Then Chiquita acknowledged last November its participation in the Better Banana Project, an environmental and social certification program monitored by the Rainforest Alliance. Over the past eight years, Chiquita spent nearly $20 million to meet project standards, company officials said.

"When the Better Banana Project first started in the early 1990s, there were clear problems with deforestation, over-reliance on pesticides, poor working conditions and waste management," said Chris Wille, director of the Better Banana Project. Plastic that resembles dry cleaning bags are used to prevent bugs from invading the harvested banana bunches. The plastic waste, along with bananas that don't meet market standards, are thrown into "big mountains of garbage" that surround banana farms. For every ton of bananas shipped, two tons of waste was being left behind.

Then on January 4, Dole Foods declared it would begin selling organic bananas under the Dole name, tapping into the $6 billion organic products market. Although at present only a fraction of the world's bananas are organically produced, that figure is growing at 25 percent a year and, with increasing consumer awareness of organic issues, it seems set to grow exponentially in years to come.

Each of these three companies, however, has a shady past. A 1998 PBS Frontline program accused Chiquita's then-President Carl Lindner of making a $500,000 donation to the Democrats in order to influence the US administration to fight the EU's banana import regime in the WTO court. When The Cincinnati Enquirer published a series of articles in May 1998 questioning Chiquita's business practices, Cincinnati-based Chiquita Brands International swiftly complained. A month later, the Enquirer renounced the series, fired lead reporter Michael Gallagher, and apologized to Chiquita. On January 23 this year, it was revealed the Enquirer's owner -- Gannett Co. Inc. -- paid Chiquita $14 million in an out-of-court settlement stemming from the expose.