Intimately Knowing Your Bananas

April 14, 2010


Though it was published two years ago, we haven't been able to shake this 2008 article on the pending banana price inflation/potential shortage from our thoughts. Not only did it predict a dire future for one of our favorite fruits, it illustrated some of the long-term cause-and-effects of globalizing the food market (spoiler alert: most of them are negative!). Henceforth, we have been stricken with agony every time we bought a $.35 cent piece from our sidewalk fruit vendor, which is unfortunately kind of often. Now we can add another bulletpoint to the extended banana anxiety checklist: Bananas!, a documentary on Nicaraguan banana workers' legal struggle against their employer, the Dole Food corporation, which exposed them to banned, toxic pesticides without any warning or precautions, while exploiting them with outrageously low wages. Good times! The US can see it soon, as it has just received distribution by Oscilloscope Laboratories, the company founded by the Beastie Boys' Adam Yauch, but the trailer above promises a fascinating, if depressing, work. Now can someone teach us to grow banana trees in our Brooklyn courtyard? Thanks. (via Ghetto Bassquake)

Intimately Knowing Your Bananas