Banana production in Brazil
Banana production in Brazil accounts for approximately 10% of the entire world banana production, making Brazil a major banana-producing country in the world. Production has steadily increased over the years, rising from 5.4 million tonnes in 1997 to almost 7 million tonnes in 2007. In 2000, Brazil was fourth, behind India, Uganda and Ecuador, in banana production. By 2006, Brazil became the second largest banana-producer, behind only India, followed by China, Ecuador and the Philippines. Most of the bananas produced are consumed domestically. Gross exports has increased from 12.5 thousand tonnes in 1995 to more than 220 thousand tonnes in 2002 and 2003, mostly to neighbours Argentina and Uruguay, but these figures are still far behind industry leaders such as Ecuador, Costa Rica, the Philippines and Colombia which export more than a million tonnes of bananas annually.
Banana production in the United States
The first commercial banana farm in the United States was established in Florida, near Silver Lake, in 1876. A number of independent banana farms and cultivars have been located in a number of areas, reaching as far north as the southern Midwest and Ohio river, where wild banana trees can be found along the banks of the Ohio at far southern Illinois, Indiana, and Missouri, just north of Kentucky. This region equates roughly with the northernmost terminus of the subtropical crop-growing region of the US, which ends at about Cincinnati, Ohio, and further east in cities and locations such as Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, New York City and Long Island in New York, and coastal regions of southern New England. Banana growth further west along this ecological transition line, such as in central to northern Missouri and northern Kansas/far southern Nebraska is highly dubious and uncertain, due to extreme temperature fluctuations and an increase in aridity.