Bananas are giant perennial herbs, which originated in Southeast Asia. Bananas were transported from their sites of origin and distributed throughout the world by man. A Spanish priest first introduced it to the Western hemisphere the early 16th century.

Banana plants are members of the genus Musa (part of the family Musaceae). Banana evolved by natural hybridization from two species Musa acuminata and Musa balbisiana. It is believed that there are almost 1000 varieties of bananas in the world today.

There are hundreds of cultivars of bananas and plantains. The greatest diversity is found in home gardens and traditional agriculture, while only a few cultivars are grown by large-scale producers for the export market. Modern cultivars are developed as older cultivars become susceptible to new diseases. Cavendi

The Cavendish variety is one of the most popular bananas used for export. The antiquities of the banana and its tendency to produce mutations or sports have resulted in an extensive number of cultivars. Here is the list of popular cultivars. The most commonly known banana is the Cavendish variety, which is the one produced for export markets.

The fiber obtained from the leaves of both the banana and the plantains are valuable in the manufacture of paper and fabrics of various kinds. In the Philippines, it is woven into a thin, transparent fabric called "agna" which is the principal material in women's blouses, men's shirts, and making handkerchiefs. In Ceylon, it is fashioned into soles for inexpensive shoes and used for floor coverings.

The Cavendish is a shorter, stubbier plant than earlier varieties. It was developed to resist plant diseases, insects and windstorms better than its predecessors. The Cavendish fruit is of medium size has a creamier, smooth texture, and a thinner peel than earlier varieties.

The banana plant does not grow from a seed but rather from a rhizome or bulb. Each fleshy bulb will sprout new shoots year after year. Thus forms a pseudo-stem that eventuates into flowers from the top of the stem, and bears seedless fruits. The eldest sucker replacing the main plant when it fruits and dies, and this process of succession continues indefinitely. Subsequently the unique reproduction mechanism ensures the regeneration to evolve for the benefit of those who enjoy banana.

The unripe fruits contain a large percentage of starch and the pulp, when dried and reduced to a powder; it makes a nutritious flour or meal. The ripe fruit contains about twenty per cent starch, the remainder having been changed into sugar during the process of ripening. The Africans make even intoxicating drinks from the juice, known as "banana beer" and "banana wine." Also the pith, the top of the flower cluster and the young and tender shoot delight the taste and nourish the body.

Banana plants and the plantain are today grown in just about every tropical place in the world. And the fruit production makes up and consists of the fourth largest fruit crop of th

Some topics in this essay:
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