BACTERIAL WILT OF BANANAS: THE MISSING ELEMENT IN INTERNATIONAL EFFORTS FOR BANANA IMPROVEMENT
Sequeira L.
Department of Plant Pathology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI 53706 USA
Diseases caused by strains and close relatives of Ralstonia solanacearum continue to be the most serious bacterial diseases in the banana and plantain industries worldwide. Moko disease in Central and South America, and in the Philippines, Bugtok disease in the Philippines, and Blood disease in Indonesia, continue to spread and cause substantial losses to commercial growers as well as to subsistence farmers. Moko disease is endemic throughout the Caribbean and Amazon basin regions, but is under reasonable control at considerable cost to producers. Outbreaks of the insect-transmitted strains (SFR and A) occur periodically in the banana-growing regions of Central America, and have virtually eliminated the Chato (Bluggoe) plantain from the local markets. In the Philippines, Bugtok disease in the Cardaba and Saba varieties is widespread throughout the country, and is known to be caused by a strain that is indistinguishable from the Moko strains of Central America. In Indonesia, Blood disease is a serious problem in the cultivar Pisang Kepok, and has spread throughout Java and Sulawesi, threatening further investments in the banana industries of these islands. In spite of the seriousness of these problems worldwide, we know very little about the origin and relationships of these bacteria. Of greater concern is the fact that banana and plantain improvement programs in Honduras, Brazil, Nigeria, Guadeloupe, etc., have no established projects to develop bacterial wilt-resistant varieties. Even the World Bank's Banana Improvement Program (BIP), which provides assistance to conventional and molecular approaches to develop banana and plantain varieties with disease resistance, does not include bacterial wilt among its projects. The Second International Bacterial Wilt Symposium provides an opportunity for concerted action to change what is an untenable situation in banana improvement programs.
