{"id":7146,"date":"2019-01-30T19:44:14","date_gmt":"2019-01-30T19:44:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/international-pest-control.com\/?p=7146"},"modified":"2019-01-30T19:58:00","modified_gmt":"2019-01-30T19:58:00","slug":"sustainable-bananas-in-greenhouses-first-dutch-bananas-harvested","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/international-pest-control.com\/wordpress\/sustainable-bananas-in-greenhouses-first-dutch-bananas-harvested\/","title":{"rendered":"Sustainable bananas in greenhouses: first \u2018Dutch bananas\u2019 harvested"},"content":{"rendered":"

R<\/strong>esearchers from Wageningen University & Research harvested the first ever Dutch bananas in December 2018. Boerenhart, a supplier of fresh and local products offered the bananas as \u2018regional produce\u2019 to restaurants and hospitals in the area around Wageningen. The cultivation took place on two types of synthetic soil substrate: coco peat and rock wool. These allow the growth of the banana plant without the settlement of aggressive fungi.<\/p>\n

In the experimental greenhouses at Wageningen this unique research project started in January 2018. \u201cTo mark the 100th anniversary of WUR, we developed this plan together with local company Boerenhart: the cultivation of a regional banana in the Wageningen greenhouses,\u201d says Professor of Tropical Plant Pathology Gert Kema. \u201cWith this experiment we are investigating whether this form of cultivation offers opportunities for further research into the control of Fusarium wilt. The wilt is a soil borne fungal pathogen that threatens banana production throughout the world, so we took the banana out of the soil.\u201d<\/p>\n

The experiment appears to have been very successful, says Prof Kema. \u201cThe banana plants grow very well on coco peat and stone wool substrate with only the application of a nutrient solution. The advantage of substrate cultivation is that nutrients can be better tailored to the needs of the plant. In addition, you prevent losses, possibly about 30%, from leakage. The Dutch bananas do not need disease control, which makes this form of cultivation more sustainable than traditional production methods.\u201d<\/p>\n

There are sixty plants in the greenhouse, but there are hundreds of thousands of hectares of banana production worldwide. \u201cOne of the things that we have learned is that the plant density in the greenhouse was too high. We are going to adjust that, so that the plants will have more light and the bunches of bananas will be able to ripen faster in future experiments\u201d, says Prof Kema.<\/p>\n

Partners in the Dutch banana project; Wageningen University & Research, Boerenhart, Triple20, Keygene and Chiquita, are interested in continuing this method of cultivation in greenhouses or other suitable buildings in order to serve small regional markets. \u201cThis is a way we can start growing other varieties, for a more diverse range of bananas. We are also planning a trial in the Philippines to see how precision cultivation works under ideal climate conditions.\u201d<\/p>\n

After the bananas in the Wageningen greenhouses had been harvested they went to a Chiquita ripening centre. \u201cWe are on the way to developing sustainable banana cultivation with new breeds of bananas that are resistant to diseases and that are grown in healthy soils in a responsible social climate,\u201d says Kema.<\/p>\n

Published in<\/strong> International Pest Control \u2013 January\/February 2019 issue<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Researchers from Wageningen University & Research harvested the first ever Dutch bananas in December 2018. Boerenhart, a supplier of fresh and local products offered the bananas as \u2018regional produce\u2019 to restaurants and hospitals in the area around Wageningen. The cultivation took place on two types of synthetic soil substrate: coco peat and rock wool. These […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4788,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[70],"tags":[612,756],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/international-pest-control.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/twitter-avatar-ipc-magazine.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/international-pest-control.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7146"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/international-pest-control.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/international-pest-control.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/international-pest-control.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/international-pest-control.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7146"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/international-pest-control.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7146\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7147,"href":"https:\/\/international-pest-control.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7146\/revisions\/7147"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/international-pest-control.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4788"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/international-pest-control.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7146"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/international-pest-control.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7146"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/international-pest-control.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7146"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}