banana journey ks2

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Idah, a member of the Kabwadu women's club, holds a bunch of bananas in Chirundu district, Zambia. Photo: Aurelie Marrier d'Unienville

Updated with new facts, photographs and stories, this cross-curricular resource will help learners aged 7-11 to discover where their food comes from.

Learners can gain a vivid insight into the banana supply chain and research the countries where bananas are grown. They will get to grips with Fairtrade and think critically about the enormous impact it can have on the lives of smallholder farmers.

• Use photographs to track the story of a banana
• Investigate the countries where bananas are grown
• Play a simulation game to take on the role of a banana farmer
• Consider the life-changing impact that Fairtrade can have
• Write fruit-themed poetry
• Learn about the life-cycles of plants
• Make a delicious banana cake

Could your learners make it as a banana farmer?

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The life of a banana

Subject: The World

Age range: 5-7

Resource type: Lesson (complete)

Last updated

8 October 2014

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brilliant lots to go on thank you

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Suitable for KS2 too

An excellent, detailed resource with interesting ideas for individual and group activities. Many thanks for sharing.

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Journey Of A Banana Activities Growing

These can be used to inspire learners in ‘enterprise’  and to show the process from farm to fork.

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This set of activities allow learners to show what they have learned from the first Presentation (which can be downloaded separately) – Growing.  Learners are encouraged to draw images of certain parts of the initial stages of growth, there is also a cut and stick activity to order the events as they happen in the growing process and an opportunity to draw a poster of an environment suitable for banana plantation.  These can be used to inspire learners in ‘enterprise’  to show how things can be developed and then sold, how the process is a business.  This activity also allows children to grasp a deeper understanding of the ‘farm to fork’ topic.

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Journey Of A Banana Presentations

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Make Bananas Fair

Watch the film to discover more about Foncho, a banana farmer from Colombia and see how Fairtrade makes a real difference to the lives of Foncho, his family and their community.

Length: 3 mins 30 secs

To download this film, click on the link to Vimeo on the right hand side and there is a ‘Download’ button just below the film’s title.

Join us on Twitter at   @FairtradeUKEd

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The Journey of a Banana

by   Daniel Ganninger

December 12, 2022

We may take for granted that a yellow banana greets us at the supermarket, but the journey for that one piece of fruit is a long one, especially for a fruit that can go bad rather quickly.

Where Do Bananas Grow?

Bananas are considered a fruit, but botanically they are classified as a berry. The banana plant is the largest herbaceous flowering plant and grows to about ten feet in height. Most banana plants grow within 30 degrees of the equator in 150 different countries spread around the globe.

There is no growing season for bananas, and they are available year-round. The time between planting a banana plant and the harvest is between 9 and 12 months, and a bunch on a banana plant produces around 170 bananas.

The Banana’s Trip

A banana’s journey from their faraway growing regions to a place like the United States is made possible in modern times because of the advances in refrigeration. The banana bunches are cut down when they are still solid green on the banana plant. This is the first stage of ripening out of seven stages that the industry uses. The almost exclusive variety of bananas being shipped to the United States is the Cavendish variety. Until the 1950s, the banana of choice was the Gros Michel , but it was completely wiped out due to a fungus.

After the bananas are harvested, the fruit is inspected, washed, separated, and packed into boxes. The bananas are refrigerated almost immediately to prevent them from ripening. The bananas are then put on reefer ships, which are refrigerated container ships. The bananas are finally ready to start their long journey.

Bananas are kept at around 58 degrees Fahrenheit during their journey to halt the ripening process. If bananas are coming from Central America, they travel the Atlantic or the Pacific Ocean and may go through the Panama Canal to get to the United States.

There are three main fruit companies that import bananas to the United States; Dole, Del Monte, and Chiquita. Dole owns and operates a total of 19 vessels, which make it the largest refrigerated fleet of reefer ships in the world. Each 40-foot container on the ship can hold 1,000 boxes, with each box holding about 100 bananas. Del Monte has a fleet of 15 owned and eight chartered refrigerated vessels. Both companies use their ships to move other fruit in addition to bananas.

Chiquita once operated the largest private fleet in the world at 100 refrigerated ships when it was the United Fruit Company. The United Fruit Company was founded in 1899. Its fleet of ships was known as the Great White Fleet since the ships were painted white so they would reflect the sun and reduce the chance of the fruit spoiling. The company sold its last 12 remaining vessels in 2007 and now charter other ships to move their bananas.

When the bananas finally arrive in port, they are offloaded and go through customs. Surprisingly, the busiest banana port in the United States is in Wilmington, Delaware, where they take in about a million tons of bananas a year. It’s also the second busiest port for bananas in the world and sits only behind Antwerp, Belgium.

The Ripening Process

The bananas are next moved to a specialized ripening facility. They begin this part of their journey in a room that is well-ventilated and sits with a relative humidity between 70 and 90 percent. Ethylene gas is then released in the room overnight to begin the process of ripening. Ethylene gas is what is naturally released as a fruit ripens.

The gas is then removed, and the room temperature is kept in the low 60s. The bananas finally begin to change color, and the facility can even ship bananas at different stages of ripening depending on what the distributor wants and the distance the bananas still have to travel. There are seven stages of ripening, and ripening at the specialized facility takes about five days. The bananas are then ready to go to regional distribution centers where they are then shipped to supermarkets.

The banana is then put on a supermarket shelf for you to buy. Many are still green with just a bit of yellow so you’ll still have time to enjoy the fruit before they turn into a mushy mess.

Sources: NY Times , Chiquita , National Geographic , Freakonomics , Flexport , Port of Wilmington , Del Monte , Atlas Obscura , Hofstra University

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