PANAMA disease or fusarium wilt, the "most dreaded" disease in the banana industry, which wiped out the whole Gros Michel cultivar in the 1960,s is spreading again, infesting the major source of livelihood of most people from the Davao region.
Banana growers and exporters are already losing thousand bananas in their plantations and millions in their pockets as they remain unaware of the solution to stop the further damage it causes. Worst, workers are not keen on following basic procedures to stem the spread.
Dr. Harry Rajamannan of the Agro-K Philippines, who has spent 45 years in Banana research and is considered as among the great minds in discovering the answers to problems in the field of agriculture shares his knowledge on the matter.
"The laborers fail to prevent the spread of this disease. They walk through the hot spot areas to collect fruits, walking through the infected area to the clean soil. It is the main distributor of this disease," he explained.
He added that he and his group has seen the laborers taking the stems of the banana fruits from the packing plant and leave it in clean areas to rot, not realizing that the stems from harvested in disease areas are also taking this fungus to infect non-infected plants.
The key to avert the further spreading of the disease is, according to him, teaching the laborers on proper bio-security protocols.
He added that in other countries (i.e. Australia, Indonesia, Costa Rica) where the presence of the fungus is also alarming, strict practice of security is imposed. No one can pass through their plantation especially if one has been to a land with reported cases of Fusarium wilt.
For now, Agro-K Philippines is developing a vaccine to be injected with the surrounding plant from the infected ones. It should prevent the banana from acquiring the disease. They are now providing these vaccines as samples to farmers who were devastated by the effects of the disease.
In another interview with the Department of Agriculture (DA) Davao Plant Pathologist Arlene Seguiro, she said that they offer the farmers whose plantations were infected with the disease several options to aid in their situation.
Among these was cordoning the portion of the banana plantation infested with the wilt, then, precede on stand-burning the infected ones to ashes where they pay the farmers P500 per mat as incentive fee.
“We do this, so we can kill the fungus while it is still on its underdeveloped stage,” she explained.
The worst that this disease can lead to is the production of chlamydosphores or resting spores. It is the stage of the fungus where it has developed full resistance from any counter poison and will survive in the soil for decades.
As assistance to the farmers, DA Davao is also providing Trichodermaharzianum, a kind of fungus which is also used as a fungicide; it has an antagonistic capability against the disease. It will be injected to the follower of the infected plant to prevent further development of the fungus.
Giant Cavendish tissue-cultured (GCTCV 219) banana is also slowly being introduced in the market as it is deemed as the new resistant variety to Panama disease Race 4. With deformed fingers, and less hands, it is inferior to Cavendish. Just like how Cavendish was inferior to Gros Michel before.
Although pesticide can protect bananas from infection, the chemicals will contaminate the water and soil in the long run.
Genetic research may re-engineer the Cavendish to resist this particular disease but again, we would have to come up with a new genetic solution for every future disease which is just another short-term solution.
Variety in the ecosystem is needed. If we form our variety of bananas, their unique growing patterns, shapes, and imperfections emerge naturally. This variation exists to protect the specie.
If this is pushed, we would not have to worry much if one genetic specimen catches the disease because by then we are not that reliant on one species alone.