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The banana is
the cheapest fruit you can buy in Canada at any time of the year and Canadians eat approximately 3 billion bananas a year.
In Canadian supermarkets bananas account for over 10% of total sales in the produce section and 1% of total sales. All this
despite the fact that the nearest plantation is 5000 kilometres away and the banana is the most perishable fruit on our store
shelves. Banana Split takes the viewer on a journey that begins with the hustle and bustle of a fruit market in Thunder Bay,
Ontario and ends up with an examination of the daily challenges of life in Honduras. In addition to being a popular fruit in
Canada, bananas are used as a staple food in more than 100 tropical and sub-tropical countries.
Click here to see a bit of Banana Split.
In the developing world, bananas rank behind rice, wheat and corn as the most important staple food crops. Filmed in Canada,
the United States, Honduras and France, Banana Split explores the North/South split between Canadian consumers and the
people whose lives revolve around the "curvaceous fruit from the herbaceous plant."
Banana Split is a winner!
Banana Split is the 2005 award winner
for the "Best Feature Length Documentary" at the
Latin America
Environmental Media Festival in New Orleans, and it is
also the 2004 winner of the Canadian International Development Agency's Deborah Fletcher Award of Excellence in Filmmaking on International Development. In addition, Banana Split was honoured by being included in the 2003 Ökomedia – International Environmental Film Festival travelling tour of Germany
and by being selected for the
Travelling World Community Film Festival. Banana Split is also a core element in the Global Education Network's teaching module on bananas. Teachers can follow the links below to find curriculum guides for all grade levels. These modules also make use of our free publication, Banana Stories/Histoires de Bananes, as point of departure for a discussion of globalization and related topics. |
