Re:The Miracle of the Modern Banana
by vanderZwan on Thursday August 11, 2016 @09:11AM
(#12267895)
I live in Sweden at the moment, in a work environment with many nationalities. You remind me of how all colleagues from countries around the Mediterranean Sea agree that the vegetables and fruit are pretty bland over here, and that the selection is pretty small as well. The reason for that is exactly what you said: the choices are limited by export-resilience.
Most people do.
The cavendish is not popular because it's good[0], it's popular because it's export-resilient: it supports green-picking and ethylene-ripening well, it handles limited refrigeration (13.5~15C) for long periods of time, it has good shelf life after artificial ripening and it looks pretty good all along (as far as western consumers are concerned anyway). A cavendish might see to two months between picking and consumption.
[0] most people I know of who have eaten other cultivars find cavendish bland and uninteresting, one of my colleagues compared it to an oatmeal sausage