Yes, we have no bananas,

The austere three storey building on Humber Street in the North of England Port of Hull holds some memories for me. 

It had been one of my first jobs, some 30 years ago, as a newly qualified Surveyor to inspect it when it was a warehouse for the storage and ripening of bananas. 

Bunker-like behind its thick outer walls and reinforced cast concrete floors it was purpose built and operated by Geest, an established household name from the marketing stickers that adorned each and every yellow fruit on the shelves of supermarkets and corner shop grocers throughout the UK. 

I remember being a little bit afraid in the dark cool spaces of the warehouse over the illogical scenario of being pursued by a large spider emerging from a crate after a prolonged stowaway on a slow moving freighter from the tropics. 

Of course nothing happened. 

That thought did however cause me to shiver as I walked through the building only yesterday. 

The place is now studio space in a Commercial and Collective enterprise. 

Just a few banana motifs on the wall provide a clue as to the historic use . 

Sadly, it may be the case in the not too distant future that bananas, as we have come to know them, will become extinct because of a combination of factors. 

There are actually many varieties of the banana, some filled with crunchy seeds, others with a red skin or of diminutive size. These continue to be grown and indeed represent some 50%  of global production but someone decided at some time in the recent past that the best banana for human delectation was to be the large, creamy fleshed and sweet yellow type of which we consume 100 billion annually. 

It was an obvious commercial decision and to date a very lucrative one. 

The classic banana, called the Cavendish , has been bred for its consumer friendly characteristics but its lack of genetic variation has made it particularly susceptible to attack from plant pathogens as well as the detrimental influences from insect infestation, soil infertility and, increasingly, climate change. 

Fusarium Wilt is one of the assailants on the banana crops in that it cuts the water drawing ability of the stem which leads to inevitable failure. It is not treatable. The pathogen black sigatoka also threatens the survival of the Cavendish and although there are chemicals available these require multiple applications which have major consequences for the workers on the plantations and for the environment. 

The relentless monoculture on a global scale of the Cavendish has provided the perfect conditions for the key enemies of the banana to continue their onslaught. 

There are now real concerns that the days of the most common banana variety are indeed numbered. 

It is again a case of human folly in the interests of globalisation and commercialism.