Monoculture

Did you know that the bananas you eat today are not the same type as the ones people were eating a few generations ago? The banana you might have had with your breakfast today is a variety called the Cavendish banana, while the one that was in grocery stores up to the 1950s was a variety called Gros Michel, which was wiped out by a disease called Fusarium wilt of banana, or FWB. FWB of Gros Michel was caused by Fusarium oxysporum race 1, a fungal pathogen that affects bananas. This fungal infection kills a plant by occupying its vascular system, blocking water and mineral transportation. You would be hard-pressed to find a Gros Michel banana in American supermarkets today. krares/iStock via Getty Images Plus Plant biologists developed the Fusarium-resistant Cavendish variety to replace the Gros Michel. Yet, over the past few decades, a resurgence of FWB caused by a different strain of the same fungu...

Consumers’ love for avocados in the United States seems to know no bounds. From 2001 through 2020, consumption of this fruit laden with healthy fats tripled nationwide, rising to over 8 pounds per person yearly. On average, 90% of those avocados are grown in the southwest Mexican state of Michoacán. As with other foods that have become trendy, such as acai berries, or widely used, such as palm oil, intensive avocado production is causing significant environmental damage. My research on 20th-century Latin American environmental history examines how the transnational movement of people, foods and agricultural technologies has changed rural landscapes in Latin America. Currently, I’m writing a book on the development of a global avocado industry centered in Michoacán, the world’s largest avocado-growing region. Michoacán has a large Indigenous population and an economy based on agriculture, fishing and ranc...

Humans have physically reconfigured half of the world’s land to grow just eight staple crops: maize (corn), soy, wheat, rice, cassava, sorghum, sweet potato and potato. They account for the vast majority of calories that people around the world consume. As global population rises, there’s pressure to expand production even further. Many experts argue that further expanding modern industrialized agriculture – which relies heavily on synthetic fertilizer, chemical pesticides and high-yield seeds – isn’t the right way to feed a growing world population. In their view, this approach isn’t sustainable ecologically or economically, and farmers and scientists alike feel trapped within this system. Corn’s evolution into a global commodity shows how industrialized agriculture has transformed farming. How can societies develop a food system that meets their needs and is also more healthy and diverse? It has p...

King Solomon may have gained some of his famed wisdom from an unlikely source – ants. According to a Jewish legend, Solomon conversed with a clever ant queen that confronted his pride, making quite an impression on the Israelite king. In the biblical book of Proverbs (6:6-8), Solomon shares this advice with his son: “Look to the ant, thou sluggard, consider her ways and be wise. Which having no guide, overseer, or ruler, provideth her meat in the summer, and gathereth her food in the harvest.” While I can’t claim any familial connection to King Solomon, despite sharing his name, I’ve long admired the wisdom of ants and have spent over 20 years studying their ecology, evolution and behaviors. While the notion that ants may offer lessons for humans has certainly been around for a while, there may be new wisdom to gain from what scientists have learned about their biology. Ants have evolved highly complex social organizations...