Banana plantation in China

Sergei Anashkevich says: “It would seem that what is the connection between a sailing regatta and a banana plantation? In fact, none at all...

It just so happened that during the filming of the regatta I had one free day, on which, without thinking twice, I went on hitchhiking inland, and there I just walked all day, visiting various plantations, peasant villages, a rural school, temples and many other incredibly interesting places.

I wandered along the way to a banana plantation ... "

(Total 10 photos)

Source: JJournal/aquatek-philips

1. ... and it turned out, as often happens, quite by accident.

There was no specific plan for moving through completely unfamiliar places, I just drove a taxi “deeper”, judging by the map, and then walked on the GPS, looking for something interesting.

So I accidentally came across an abandoned pandan plantation (I’ll tell you about it another time), and behind it, across the stream, I saw a banana plantation ...

2. It is interesting that there, behind the stream, the road going through the pandan plantation is unpaved, and here, on the banana one, it is paved.

Apparently, bananas as an agricultural crop are important here. At the entrance to this "banana paradise" is a concrete gatehouse, which turned out to be completely empty. I did not meet anyone on the plantation itself ...

3. Bananas here look completely different from what we are used to seeing in our supermarkets. Here the fruits are square instead of round.

They grow on low trees in huge, heavy clusters.

4. The bunch itself is, in fact, a huge flower, at the base of which fruits begin to form. The flower itself grows down, hanging on a long proboscis-like process.

At a certain point in the formation of fruits, the flower is cut off near the bunch itself. If this is not done, it will consume a lot of nutrients from the tree and the fruits will not gain the required volume and will not have the necessary consumer properties.

5. This is what a banana blossom looks like.

6. After the flower is cut down, the fruits develop for some time, gaining weight and volume, and then ...

7. ... they put on a huge plastic bag.

It is needed so that raindrops do not fall on the ripening fruits and dew does not set, otherwise the bananas will deteriorate before they are cut.

8. So they grow in plastic bags for eleven weeks. Bananas are not brought to full ripeness, because from here they are taken to different parts of the world, besides, the fruits also dry out during transportation.

9. Interestingly, bananas do not grow evenly on all trees here. Somewhere they are already under the bags, somewhere else they are only gaining volume, and somewhere a flower is just ripening ...

10. And then, behind the banana plantation, the mango plantation begins.

And here it is absolutely the same story with the degree of ripeness of fruits. On some trees they are small and are just beginning to form into their usual form, on some they are almost ripe, and on some they have just been harvested.

The thing is that the climate here, in Hainan, is such that many crops bear fruit almost in a continuous cycle, without interruption for the winter and seasons ...