BANANA producers are being given some common sense advice: ensure healthy crops by maintaining healthy soil. Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry (DAFF) principal nematologist Dr Tony Pattison said healthy soil was good insurance against soil-borne diseases, such as plant-parasitic nematodes and the potentially devastating Panama disease or fusarium wilt.
"Race 1 of Panama disease, which is found in Queensland, attacks some specialty banana cultivars such as ladyfingers and sugar bananas, but not cavendish," Dr Pattison said.
"Our scientists are finding it is possible to manage the disease in specialty cultivars by simply improving the health of the soil.
"Soil health needs to be taken as seriously as managing our own health.
"When we have poor health, we are more susceptible to diseases.
"Likewise, poor soil management increases the risk of diseases in crops.
"Just as indicators are important in monitoring and managing diagnosis of human health, such as blood tests, indicators are equally important in keeping track of soil health.
"Indicators may tell us what the problems are, but some of them may be inherent to particular soil types.
"This means we need to apply special management practices to keep the soil productive."
Dr Pattison said short-term methods of improving poor soil health, such as pesticides and tillage, often only addressed the symptoms of poor soil health.
"Long-term management of soil health often requires a change in production systems and the way we grow bananas, just as managing our own health problems requires changes in lifestyle," he said.
"These may be difficult to implement at first, but over time it can achieve long-term improvements. Trials show the use of a living ground cover around the banana plants has suppressed the symptoms of Panama disease in the highly susceptible sugar banana cultivar and helped increase production."
Where the living ground cover was established, only 25pc of plants showed leaf yellowing associated with Panama disease and 70pc of the bunches were harvested. This compares to plants grown in bare soil, where 67pc of plants displayed Panama disease symptoms and only 40pc of bunches could be harvested.
The living ground cover around the plants allowed a 25pc increase in bunch weight relative to the plants grown in bare soil. The differences in disease symptoms and bunch production were closely related to the improved biology of the soil.
Dr Pattison said no magic cure was available to fight off Panama disease in banana, and once present it could not be totally eliminated.
"Therefore, the disease needs to be managed using as many different strategies as possible, with quarantine being at the top of the list, closely followed by improved soil health."
Races 1, 2 and 3 of Panama disease are not to be confused with the devastating race 4, which is not present in Queensland. DAFF research into the four strains of Panama disease is conducted with funding support from the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research.
