Banana plantation
Banana plants may grow with varying degrees of success in diverse climatic conditions, but commercial banana plantations are primarily found in equatorial regions, in banana exporting countries. The four leading banana export countries worldwide are Ecuador, Costa Rica, Philippines, and Colombia. Ecuador provides more than 33% of global banana exports. In 2004, banana producing countries totaled 130. Production, as well as exports and imports of bananas, are nonetheless concentrated in a few equatorial countries. 75% of total banana production in 2004 was generated in 10 counties. India, Ecuador, Brazil and China produced half of total bananas. Latin American and Caribbean countries led banana production up to the 1980s, and Asian nations took the lead in banana production during the 1990s. African production levels have remained mostly unchanged.
Banana production in Belize
Banana production in Belize began in the late nineteenth century when it was a British colony, when American and British investors established the first plantations. Over the last
70 years, the pattern of banana production has gradually shifted away from large scale American and British owned company production to smaller-scale localised indigenous farming primarily targeted at the European market. 
The Banana trade began between British Honduras and New Orleans. Commerce was wiped out in the 1920s by an outbreak of the Panama disease. Plantations were destroyed again by hurricanes in 1975 and 1978. The subsequent takeover of banana cultivation by the Banana Control Board, a public enterprise, had the effect of further inhibiting production.