escapee wrote:


You are also incorrect about "profit motive" since many organic farms are very
small, and sell their produce at farmers markets, not on grocery shelves. I
have news, the grocery stores hike up the prices, not the growers. For
instance, bananas. If you see the word organic on a banana, it's generally a
useless term. Bananas normally never need pesticides to produce.

I don't know where you got your information, but it's not correct, I'm afraid. Emile
Frison is one of the world's leading banana researchers, and according to Dr. Frison:

www.futureharvest.org/pdf/banana.pdf
[]
Bananas are threatened by the rapidly spreading fungus Black Sigatoka that has been
undermining banana production for the past three decades. It has reached almost every
banana-growing region in the world and typically reduces yield by 30 to 50 percent.
Other
diseases and pests that cripple yields include a soil fungus, parasitic worms, weevils,
and
viruses such as the Banana Streak Virus, which lurks inside the banana genome itself.
Commercial growers can afford and rely extensively on chemical fungicides, often
spraying their crops 50 times per year—the equivalent of spraying nearly once per week,
which is about 10 times the average for intensive agriculture in industrialized
countries. Chemical inputs account for 27 percent of the production cost of export
bananas. Agricultural chemicals used on bananas for diseases and pests have harmed the
health of plantation workers and the environment.
“If we can devise resistant banana varieties, we could possibly do away with fungicides
and pesticides all together,” said Frison. “In addition, resistant strains are essential
for small-holder farmers, who cannot afford the expensive chemicals to begin with. When
Black Sigatoka strikes, farmers can do little more than watch their plants die.
Increased hunger can swiftly follow.”
[]
www.futureharvest.org/pdf/banana.pdf

EV