Bananas in Asia are increasingly threated by Banana Blood disease, a disease that causes fruit rot, leaf wilt and plant death; it has no known cure.
Banana Blood disease was first reported in Kayuadi Island in South Sulawesi, Indonesia in 1905 and devastated the banana plantations. The disease was contained to this small area for 60 years due to restrictions on movement of banana plant materials, but eventually it escaped.
In 1987, Blood disease was found in West Java and it spread rapidly across the Indonesian archipelago – it is now recorded in 25 of the 34 provinces. The disease was so brutal that many farmers were forced to abandon production. More recently the disease has made it to peninsular Malaysia, making it highly likely the disease will continue to spread to other Asian countries.
Source: scienceblog.com
