With its five decades of experience, Taiwan is helping Central and South American countries fight fusarium wilt in bananas, and was involved in a video conference earlier this month attended by nearly 500 experts from 28 nations, the International Cooperation and Development Fund (ICDF) said yesterday.
The banana trade is vital to the economies of Central and South American countries, and the disease poses a great threat to their banana production, ICDF Deputy Secretary-General Alex Shyy (史立軍) told a news briefing at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Taipei.
The fungal disease, which devastates plants’ vascular systems, could be described as the “cancer” of bananas and spores can survive in soil for decades, a report by the Taiwan Banana Research Institute said.
Photo courtesy of the International Cooperation and Development Fund
Taiwan first identified the disease in bananas in Pingtung County in 1967, the institute said, adding that it destroyed nearly 4,000 hectares of banana trees in Pingtung and Kaohsiung in a few years, dealing a severe blow to the nation’s banana exports.
The disease was linked to soil degradation caused by the use of chemical fertilizers, the report said.
After Colombia last year reported its first case of the disease, Central America’s International Regional Organization for Plant and Animal Health (OIRSA) asked to work with the ICDF again, after the two fought citrus greening disease together, Shyy said.
Taiwan has an edge in fighting fusarium wilt because of certain disease-resistant banana strains developed by the institute, as well as research and testing techniques developed by National Taiwan University (NTU), he said.
Institute director Chao Chih-Ping (趙治平), NTU plant pathology professor Hung Ting-hsuan (洪挺軒) and OIRSA members joined the ICDF on a trip to inspect banana farms in Guatemala, Belize and Honduras from Feb. 2 to Feb. 14, Shyy said.
A video conference at OIRSA’s office in Guatemala on Feb. 5 also attracted more than 500 experts from 28 nations, including Colombia and Ecuador, as well as Caribbean countries, he said.
When it comes to sustainable banana production, the nation can proudly say: “Taiwan can help,” Shyy added.
In related news, the agency is helping the Marshall Islands employ hydroponics to improve its self-sufficiency with regard to food, despite having infertile soil and inclement weather conditions, Shyy said.
Super Typhoon Kong-rey is the largest cyclone to impact Taiwan in 27 years, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said today. Kong-rey’s radius of maximum wind (RMW) — the distance between the center of a cyclone and its band of strongest winds — has expanded to 320km, CWA forecaster Chang Chun-yao (張竣堯) said. The last time a typhoon of comparable strength with an RMW larger than 300km made landfall in Taiwan was Typhoon Herb in 1996, he said. Herb made landfall between Keelung and Suao (蘇澳) in Yilan County with an RMW of 350km, Chang said. The weather station in Alishan (阿里山) recorded 1.09m of
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The Central Weather Administration (CWA) yesterday at 5:30pm issued a sea warning for Typhoon Kong-rey as the storm drew closer to the east coast. As of 8pm yesterday, the storm was 670km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻) and traveling northwest at 12kph to 16kph. It was packing maximum sustained winds of 162kph and gusts of up to 198kph, the CWA said. A land warning might be issued this morning for the storm, which is expected to have the strongest impact on Taiwan from tonight to early Friday morning, the agency said. Orchid Island (Lanyu, 蘭嶼) and Green Island (綠島) canceled classes and work
KONG-REY: A woman was killed in a vehicle hit by a tree, while 205 people were injured as the storm moved across the nation and entered the Taiwan Strait Typhoon Kong-rey slammed into Taiwan yesterday as one of the biggest storms to hit the nation in decades, whipping up 10m waves, triggering floods and claiming at least one life. Kong-rey made landfall in Taitung County’s Chenggong Township (成功) at 1:40pm, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The typhoon — the first in Taiwan’s history to make landfall after mid-October — was moving north-northwest at 21kph when it hit land, CWA data showed. The fast-moving storm was packing maximum sustained winds of 184kph, with gusts of up to 227kph, CWA data showed. It was the same strength as Typhoon Gaemi, which was the most
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