rs have been urged to look beyond the popularity of the dominant Cavendish variety in a bid to protect themselves from the potentially devastating impact of a disease outbreak.With Cavendish representing more than 95 per cent of all bananas grown and sold in Australia, the industry knows it could effectively be wiped out overnight if a biological incursion such as Panama Race 4 were to happen.
It's a dilemma that's dominated the agenda of the national banana roadshow series, where growers learned of some of the new varieties being trialled by researchers.
Varieties such as High Noon, Hom Thong Mokho and Fa'i Palagi may not be household names when compared with their instantly recognisable and ever popular cousin, the Cavendish. But they're being seriously assessed as part of a long-term strategy to reduce the Australian banana industry's reliance on a single variety.
Mike Smith from the Queensland Agriculture Department, is a senior research scientist working on the Banana Plant Protection project.
He knows he has his work cut out for him, but not because of any biological barrier to growing these other varieties, mainly with an emphasis on disease resistance.
"I think because you have a great emphasis on Cavendish in the market it's always going to be a little bit more difficult to introduce something new to the Australian consumers."
"But no, there's no physical limitation to growing new varieties. This is a great environment for growing bananas and you can grow all sorts of bananas here and there are people growing a range of banana varieties."
It's clear the solution is a long way off as the banana industry grapples with the conundrum that it's biggest commercial advantage may become its weakest link in the event of a biosecurity incursion.
Christopher Pissato grows 150 acres of bananas at Innisfail, and, like many attending the national banana roadshow, is adamant keeping a disease such as Panama Race 4 out of Australia is far preferable than finding alternative banana varieties.
"The other varieties are interesting for us to look at, but I think there's still a lot of research that needs to be put into them and then there's also (the question of) are they good from a marketing point of view? I don't think anyone's really looked too far into that yet.
"There's no point in us growing these new varieties if no-one wants to eat them."
Len Collins owns several farms at Tully and is in the process of establishing a new one at Lakeland, 300 kilometres north, a decision that reflects the industry's desire to diversify its production base and minimise vulnerabilities to a biosecurity incursion such as Panama Race 4.
"We're all picking on trailers and moving through every paddock with soil on it, and there's no way it can be stopped, especially in the Tully and Johnstone area where it floods virtually every year and those waters are moving from one farm to the other.
"So I think we need a focus to keep it out of North Queensland."
Mr Collins is not a fan of increasing varieties for the sake of market differentiation, but says disease resistance must remain the sole focus of the research efforts.
"Cavendish is king the world over. People for their palate seem to like the Cavendish, and there's been many other varieties tried and they just haven't taken off."
Naomi King, a developmental horticulturalist with the Department of Agriculture, says increasing the presence of Australian bananas on supermarket shelves is an objective that has commercial benefits beyond boosting biosecurity resilience.
But ultimately, Ms King says, the market success or failure of any new variety will probably be determined by individuals rather than a whole-of-industry approach.
"It might be a challenge, but it's a really important step for the industry to take, to increase the diversity consumers can buy."
