Scientists announce breakthrough in Banana Wilt

By; Our Reporter

Scientists from the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) have announced a breakthrough in the search for banana varieties that are resistant to the lethal bacterial banana wilt disease.

The disease, which causes premature ripening and rotting of the fruits, wilting, and eventually death of the plant, has drastically affected the highland cooking banana production in East and Central Africa (ECA) and the food and income of millions of farmers.

Until now, the scientific world believed that all banana varieties in the region, except for a wild-seeded banana called Musa balbisiana, were susceptible to the disease, which originated from Ethiopia and has now invaded all banana growing areas in the highlands of eastern and central Africa.

The discovery by the team led by Prof Rony Swennen, Head of banana breeding; Dr George Mahuku, Senior Plant Pathologist for Eastern, Southern and Central Africa; and Dr Valentine Nakato, Plant Pathologist, gives promise to eradicating the disease.

IITA and NARO have developed superior high-yielding matoke hybrids dubbed NARITA and now those NARITA, which were developed with the resistant banana varieties, will be screened for bacterial wilt resistance and become part of future breeding schemes to develop bacterial wilt resistant matoke varieties.

Other partners in the study included the University of Pretoria, South Africa and Centre of the Region Haná for Biotechnological and Agricultural Research, Institute of Experimental Botany, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic.