Today we started early on our adventure to the banana plantation. There we got to learn about the bananas we eat in the U.S. What i found out was that they are all one type of banana and if they are not organic they usually from Chiquita. Chiquita is the main producer of bananas in Costa Rica but we went to a smaller farm that produces them organically. A special thing about bananas is that they are a plant and not a tree so the “trunks” you see are just stems. Here in Costa Rica they make much more dishes out of bananas than they do in the states.

We later went to a pineapple plantation which is the largest fruit export in Costa Rica. They were also an organic plantation but it was very different because we got to take a tractor around. There we got to the main stages of a pineapples growth. At first they till the soil and mix it up to make sure it is moist so that they can plant the seeds. Then they cover the soil in plastic to maintain the moisture and stop weeds from growing. In the end they have workers tear off the pineapples from the freshly grown plants if they have over a 14% sugar content in their juice.

A major difference I saw in the bananas and pineapples from coffee was that their production is more grow, pick/cut, and export rather than grow, wash, roast, export. This lets them save on some costs since there are less places for middle men to be. Banana and pineapple plantations also suffer from the effects of climate change because it changes how water flows therefore making their harvests harder and leading to need more year round and sustainable ways of watering. I would personally want to work on a banana farm because it seems like an easier way to stay out of the sun and the banana loads seem more fun to move around than the coffee baskets.