Eighty percent of the exported bananas in the world are grown in Latin America (Costa Rica, Panama, Columbia). A local farmer has no other alternative than to sell for a price offered by the multinational company. When working conditions and ecology is in question, these companies (Dole Food, Chiquita,…) have nothing to do with it – the plantations are not theirs, they are only buyers.

Local governments in the attempt of organizing banana export provide low duty taxes on export, they try to influence social and environmental politics, they attract the big companies to their countries. If the local governments did not do it by themselves, the big companies would threaten with going somewhere else…

Photography and esseay by Jan Sochor