Have scientists finally found a way to save the banana from disaster?

Fernando García Bastidas, KeyGene’s TR4 expert, at work on the banana-breeding programme. Photograph: Courtesy of KeyGene

Love them or loathe them, bananas are one of the world’s most popular fruit. But a combination of the climate crisis and new killer diseases have had growers concerned over the banana’s threatened extinction, something that would impose a huge toll on farmers in countries from Guatemala to Malawi, alongside eradicating a staple food.

Now researchers say they have made fresh advances in the race to save them from disaster. This month, Yelloway – a research collaboration between Chiquita, the world’s largest banana company, and the crop-improvement company KeyGene – announced it had developed a fully fertile Cavendish banana, meaning it may be possible, through cross-breeding, to create new banana varieties that are commercially viable and resistant to disease.