Western Australia’s banana production in the key banana growing town of Carnarvon has dropped to its lowest point in approximately two decades, according to a report by the ABC.
The Sweeter Banana Cooperative’s regional packing shed is reportedly seeing capacity 70 per cent below average, a figure down from the severely reduced numbers seen during the late 2010 floods.
The decline in production has been attributed to ongoing drought and the heatwave at the beginning of 2013, which have taken a serious toll on crops.
'Those bunches that came out (during January’s heatwave) are now at the point where they should be picking and there's obviously been some damage because they're coming on very slowly, they're not ripening and we're having bunches fall out of trees for no reason,' the Sweeter Banana Cooperative’s business manager Doriana Mangili told the ABC.
The drought has meant that the Gascoyne River, which growers rely on for their produce, has not been recharged with fresh flow for two seasons.
'A lot of that water is salty and growers aren't able to pump from their own wells and they're needing to draw from the (irrigation pipeline) scheme,” said Mangili. “Just looking at the weather forecast for the next couple of days, (there's) some rain coming and we're hoping that will push into the catchment and it will be enough for a river flow.'
Carnarvon typically produces approximately 5,000 tonnes of bananas annually.
