The Shit is (Ethical) Bananas: A Berkeley Shopping Guide

I first started eating bananas as a child, like most, as the fruit’s soft texture makes it an ideal introductory solid food for infants. Bananas are an excellent source of vitamin B6, manganese, and potassium. They’re a great pre-workout food and versatile as a grab-and-go snack with a natural biodegradable packaging. Bananas can even serve as additions to breakfast, lunch, dinner, and dessert recipes. At about 25% of the price of a small basket of McDonald’s fries—per banana—and healthier to boot, the year-round crop is probably one of the most affordable fruits on the market and well within tighter college budgets.

I reintroduced myself to bananas six months ago. Even with Gwen Stefani vouching for the fruit, I’d successfully avoided regular banana ingestion for nearly eight years, for a variety of reasons.

1. They have a relatively foreign taste and texture.
2. They’re unfortunately phallic for middle school kids.
3. They’re not an economical fruit for low-calorie diets.
4. They have a colonial and exploitative history.
5. They can still harbor unethical harvesting practices.
6. They don’t grow locally, unless you’re in the tropics.
7. They’re best avoided for those with latex allergies.
8. They’re not genetically modified, but they’re all clones.
9. Piranhas don’t eat bananas.

Over time, I outgrew #1-3. #7 didn’t apply to me. And I came to a moderate compromise with #6, after coming to college and moving closer to the fruit’s primary cultivation region. I also came to terms with #9, which is probably a lost cause. As for #8, it’s not a fact that irks me. Most of our modern-day varieties have been stable grafts for tens of thousands of years under threat (and occasionally successful attack) of disease.

#4 and 5 are the main contestants for the case against bananas. After all, “banana republics” aren’t simply chain workwear retail stores. Much of Latin America is plagued with a history of foreign landownership and indebted workers. The United Fruit Company (now commonly known as Chiquita) was particularly notorious in Cuba and Guatemala. The shit was, indeed, bananas back in the day, but with increased attention on the banana-producing regions of the world and international labor conditions, consumers have become a source of recourse for banana workers. But even though most bananas are the same genetically, not all bananas are farmed equally.

Like most markets, the best banana option varies based on consumer preference, is subject to regional availability, and is not always informationally transparent. Primarily concerned about labour conditions and heavy pesticide use, I reentered the banana market cautiously, taking note of companies and sources. The following findings are simply observations gathered over the fall 2015 semester, with some post-errands research.

Because heavy pesticide use was a concern, and price differences between conventional and organic bananas were negligible at two or three bananas per week, I opted for the organic option because it was more likely to be fair trade (or labelled as such). Free of conventional chemical treatment, they are less likely to have cross-allergenic compounds (for those with latex allergies). From observation, the organic/trade options also tended to be sourced more consistently over the semester.

At the four major food retailers in Berkeley, I found Dole (Safeway and Trader Joe’s), Whole Foods Whole Trade (Whole Foods), and unmarked (Berkeley Bowl) bananas, tracing Whole Trade direct sources to EARTH and Turbana via the Whole Foods website, and Berkeley Bowl organic bananas to Peruvian co-op CEPIBO by deduction (the sign at the store had read “fair trade” and “Peru”).

Dole, being the fresh fruit mammoth that it is, was the most difficult to find positive information on. Its organic program summary claims that their fruit “follow the organic production standards as set by the law in the US, Canada, EU, Japan and Korea as well as those applicable in the country of origin,” which, for a fruit not yet commercially genetically modified, doesn’t seem to be a claim worth contesting. Unfortunately, neither Dole nor its Organic line ranks very high on ethical practice guides including the UK’s Ethical Consumer banana slider; the company’s image has been tarnished multiple times in recent history and its 20th century underpinning as the Standard Fruit Company does not aid its reputation as a leading banana supplier.

It seems like Dole, alongside other major producers, is making an effort to ethically produce consumer edibles, but it is unclear—even from their own sources—how large of an effort.

Almost every week this past semester, the Whole Trade bananas available at the Berkeley Whole Foods located south of campus on Telegraph Avenue were—assuming the information given is accurate and complete—from EARTH’s farm in Costa Rica. (By this reasoning, if you come across Whole Trade bananas sourced from Colombia, chances are they’re Turbana bananas.) EARTH University, founded in 1990 as a private, non-profit learning institution for sustainable agriculture and development, chose to continue operations on a banana farm they inherited upon purchasing land for the school’s construction. Today, the farm is integrated into research and education programs while creating “revenues that contribute to fund financial aid for students of the institution and a source of jobs and income for labor from neighboring localities to college.”

A quick Google query found no major controversy and the Food Empowerment Project recommends EARTH bananas.

The vegan food justice non-profit also recommends Equal Exchange bananas, one of several fair trade banners under which CEPIBO bananas are brought to the US. The Piurana Central Association of Small Producers of Organic Banana of Peru (CEPIBO) is a non-profit co-operative formed in 2003 by organic farmers in northern Peru. Today, 1,200 producers work together to develop training programs and business practices on over 1,500 hectares of cropland. With fair trade price premiums, the co-op has been able to increase its post-harvest and export capacities with new infrastructure valued at more than two million US dollars.

Although fair trade is not without its own controversy, there is—at the very least—some improvement in operative transparency.

What I have gathered here represents only the bare minimum of online research and customer service phone calls; there are certainly ways to dig deeper, and I’m certain it gets mushier the further you go. Again, I emphasize that I have taken the information provided by company sources and service representatives at face value. There may certainly be errors in my reasoning. Furthermore, the sources mentioned are completely subject to change, both internally and at grocers’ discretion.

While a similar list could be compiled for myriad food and non-food commodities, reluctance to adjust for one because you don’t do so for others simply maintains the status quo. With this information in hand, go bananas—but remember, everything in moderation.

*In case you’re wondering, I usually pick up a few trade bananas each week from Whole Foods these days, but that’s a personal decision involving a few other factors such as convenience, taste, and price.