b'16American Journal of Transportation ajot.com(CRISIScontinued from page 15)bothofthesegiantsreportonlynegligiblebananaexports. Although both China and India have added significant acreage to their banana cultivationeffectively doubling the acreage in the period from 2000-2018.Ofcourse,therealityisglobalproductionfiguresfor bananas is more a guesstimate than hard agribusiness numbers. Banana cultivation is largely in the hands of small farms and the trade is often little more than village markets. There are well over a thousand varieties of bananas but most are used in non-commercialactivities. TheFAOestimatesthat70%-80%of production in Africa is local bananas largely used for cooking. Thecommercialbananayieldsperhectarevarywidely, influenced by banana variety, climate and agricultural inputs East Coast Warehouse operates temperature-controlled facilities in Elizabeth, nj and Philadelphia, PA. such as fertilizers and pesticides, ranging from 30-60 tonnes per hectare. For temperature-controlled logistics,e xtinCtione vent : t hreat oFtr4uncertainty rules in pandemics wake AvastmajorityoftheplantationcropistheCavendish banana, but that wasnt always the case. The banana that started Reopenings success, post-lockdown consumer behavior is a wild card. the banana boom in the 1870s in the United States and Europe was Gros Michelnicknamed the Big Mike. The Gros Michel By Peter Buxbaum, AJOT arrived on the breakfast tables of the U.S. through circuitous circumstances beginning in Southeast Asia with stops in Marti-Temperature-controlledupon the extent to which soci- pre-pandemic tastes in food,nique and Jamaica before becoming a plantation staple in Hon-logistics in the United Statesety and the economy are ableandwhetheranotherlock- duras, Costa Rica and South and Central America.The Big is an industry in which supplytoreopen,thetrajectoryofdown will be required.Mike was the fruit of legend as it launched the Great White anddemandareeconomicrecovery,whether(UNCERTAINTYcontin- Fleet and was variety put to song, Yes we have no bananas, verytightlyconsumers will resume theirued on page 18) (CRISIScontinued on page 17)connected. The unprecedented C O V I D - 1 9 pandemichas tested the resil-iency of that industrys capabili-ties,asconsumershoarded goods,especiallyfood,cre-atinggapsintheirflowsto retailers. But some shortages went beyondsupply-chainhic-cups.Thousandsofmeat workers contracted COVID-19, prompting the closure of dozensofproductionfacili-ties and creating bottlenecks in the nations meat and live-stock supply chains. Accord-ing to a report from CoBank KnowledgeExchange,meat supplieswereshrinking by30%asMemorialDay approached, leading to retail priceincreasesashighas 20%, a situation likely to per-sist at least through June. L oCkdowni mpaCtsMeanwhile,locked-down consumersstockedupon non-perishablefoodstuffslike cannedbeansandrice,while cutting down on fresh alterna-tives. That led directly to the demiseoftheUnionPacific Railroads Cold Connect oper-ations,amultimodalservice thatofferedend-to-endtrans-portation for refrigerated loads. Logistics providers were alsocalledupontopriori-tizethedeliveryofCOVID cargoes.HawaiianAirlines, forexample,setupanew cargo service to deliver gro-ceriestoruralcommunities on Molokai. United Airlines transformed one of its cargo facilitiesinHoustonintoa food distribution center. Ascommunitiesinthe United States began reopen-inginMay,foodinflation, highunemployment,and aweakU.S.economyleft many consumers in financial strain. Whether these condi-tions will persist will depend'