The banana we eat today is not the banana of our ancestors.
In the 1950s, the Gros Michel banana, which we ate for almost a century, was destroyed by a fungal plague — Panama disease. But we wouldn't be dissuaded by the decline of one banana species: We simply moved to another. And so the Cavendish banana, which you are used to seeing on grocery store shelves, has reigned supreme for decades.
But Panama disease wasn't the only threat out there. Black Sigatoka disease is coming for us, and Cavendish populations are rapidly declining. So are the populations of other banana species, and so the world will soon face another banana crisis.
We could solve this problem by moving to a different banana, of course, but fungus could come for that species too. Besides, what if that banana tastes worse? We've already come a step down from the Gros Michel, why would we want to descend still further?
The answer is a phrase that conspiracy theorists of all political stripes fear — genetic engineering.
Before everyone who thinks Monsanto or the government is trying to poison the population panics, just remember that it's already too late. Every Cavendish banana that you eat is a clone of a single banana from before the turn of the century. They can't reproduce by themselves because they've already been genetically engineered out of having functional seeds. This is great for getting the same banana taste we all know and love in every banana, without the hassle of the massive seeds that bananas have in the wild, but the problem with cloned bananas is this: There's no genetic diversity. Because all the bananas we eat have the same genetic code, they are all equally resistant to Panama disease ... and all equally vulnerable to Black Sigatoka.
Typically, in a species-level extinction event, some organisms of a species will be able to survive by being especially well-suited genetically for moving past that event. In a cloned banana, not so. Without genetic diversity, no banana is more suited than another to fight back against an infection or parasite. The only real way to introduce genetic diversity without sacrificing the seedless quality of your bananas is to insert genes that could be fungus-resistant. Conventional methods of banana-breeding have already failed, and it's time to move on to the sort of mad science that scares the 65 percent of Americans who ignore the overwhelming scientific consensus that GMOs are safe for consumption.
Go bananas, scientists. Save this fruit — not only for Americans, who on average buy 28 pounds of bananas a year, but also for poorer countries, who grow it as a staple food. It is the fourth most important food crop in the world, after rice, wheat and corn, and we can't afford to let it slip through our fingers because we're scared of a technology we're already using to make our bananas easier to eat.
Yes, plenty of Americans are needlessly frightened of genetic engineering. But if we want to keep our bananas, we might have to get used to it.