Scaling continuous improvement in family organic export banana (BOFX)

Executive Summary

Family organic bananas produced for exportation provide viable livelihoods for thousands of families in Ecuador, Peru, and the Dominican Republic, generating weekly income and employing local labor. These producers are under pressure from increasing losses from bananas being rejected due to red rust caused by Thrips, increasing costs for fertilizers, and greater climatic variability. The FTG-RF-1332-RG project developed ecological intensification strategies such as bagging the banana bud before it opens, monitoring the causes of banana rejects and the frequency of pesticide applications, nutrient balance, and strategic placement of banana plant residues and fertilizers. These promising practices will be promoted among 50 pilot producers in each country who will later serve as the starting point for larger producer groups to expand the use of the practices. The producers and their associations will have the support of an application Ma$ Banano that facilitates data collection from the field uploaded to an online database through a routine of diagnosis, follow-up, and monitoring. Teams in each association and in a sectorial working group will use the data collected in discussions to inform continuous improvement and benchmarking

The technological solution

We are implementing and monitoring a technology scaling process for the management of red rust Thrips and soil health, using an application called Ma$ Banano for cell phones. Ma$ Banano supports the capture and transmission of diagnostic, follow-up, and monitoring data in the integration of ecological intensification strategies such as bagging the emerging flower before it opens, monitoring percent and causes of fruit rejected for export, use of pesticides, nutrient input-output calculation and strategic placement of banana plant residues and fertilizers. Men and women growers, their technical advisors and grower groups apply continuous improvements and benchmarking to analyze collected data to increase productivity and profitability of family organic export banana growing.

Results

Beneficiaries

Throughout the 42-month project, the direct beneficiaries of the project are 2,400 producers (25% women) (800 Dominican Republic, 800 Peru and 800 Ecuador) and 12 BOFX organizations (5 Dominican Republic, 4 Peru and 3 Ecuador).

In the years following the end of the project, it is projected that indirect beneficiaries will reach 7,500 producers and 25 organizations in the three countries.

Sustainable Development Goals

Main donors

Dissemination products