Ensete ventricosum (Welw.) Cheesman

Kew Species Profiles

General Description

The Ethiopian banana is a close relative of the dessert banana (cultivars of Musa acuminata). However, as much as it looks like a 'regular' banana plant, the Ethiopian banana is not cultivated for its fruits, but rather for its vegetative parts. In southern and south-western Ethiopia, the starch-rich pseudostems and underground organs serve millions of people as a staple food, similar to potatoes elsewhere. In tropical and subtropical gardens the Ethiopian banana is a popular ornamental, producing very large 'banana leaves' marked by a conspicuous purple to purplish-brown midrib. A spectacular architectural plant, in Britain this species can be grown in containers to afford temperate gardens a tropical flair in summer.

Species Profile

Geography and distribution

Native to tropical East Africa, from Ethiopia to Angola, the Ethiopian banana (like the majority of species in the Musaceae, or banana family) is a plant of moist and open habitats, rather than closed woody communities. It is usually found along swamp margins, on river banks and in open, moist mountain forests at altitudes ranging from 1,400 to 3,100 m above sea level. It is also widely cultivated in south and south-western Ethiopia.

Description

Ensete ventricosum is a perennial plant that grows 6-12 m high. As with other members of the genus and the 'true' bananas ( Musa spp.), its unbranched 'stems' are actually pseudostems made up of tightly-overlapping leaf sheaths, left behind when the leaf blade has died. The pseudostem is 1.5-5 m tall and widens at the base, giving rise to the specific name ventricosum (Latin for swollen or inflated on one side). Both the leaf midrib and the pseudostem are often variably stained purple or purplish-brown. As in other bananas, the main pseudostem dies after flowering and fruiting. However, unlike other bananas, the Ethiopian banana rarely produces suckers unless the plants are intentionally induced to do so for vegetative propagation.

Depending on the clone (or cultivar) and environmental conditions, flowering occurs after about four to eight years. The flowers are produced in conspicuous 2-3 m long inflorescences which are borne directly at the apex of each pseudostem. The 4-8.5 cm long, white to cream-coloured flowers are bisexual or male, and occasionally also female. Bisexual and (if present) female flowers are found at the base of the inflorescence, whereas male flowers are produced closer to the apex. The floral display is supported by large maroon-purple bracts subtending large groups ('hands') of flowers.

The yellow or orange-coloured fruits are 8-15 cm long and up to 4-5 cm in diameter, usually with a persistent style and floral remains. There are usually 15-25 very hard, black seeds per fruit, although numbers vary from 0-40. The seeds are embedded in an edible but tasteless orange pulp and vary in size (1.2-2.3 x 1.2-1.8 x 0.9-1.6 cm). They vary in shape from nearly spherical to flattened and irregular, and from deeply striate (grooved) to almost smooth. Monkeys and birds are the most likely dispersers of the seeds.

Conservation assessments carried out by Kew

Ensete ventricosum is being monitored as part of the Sampled Red List Index Project, which aims to produce conservation assessments for a representative sample of the world's plant species. This information will then be used to monitor trends in extinction risk and help focus conservation efforts where they are most needed.

Uses

Although also found in other East African countries, the Ethiopian banana is only grown as a crop in Ethiopia, where it has been eaten for thousands of years. In south and south-western Ethiopia, Ensete ventricosum is the most important staple food crop. In this region, 11-15 million people rely on the starch contained in the leaf sheaths and pseudostems for their survival. After chopping and grating, the pulp of the pseudostems is used as a flour to prepare 'kocho' bread, porridge or soup. The underground stem (rhizome) is also boiled and eaten like potatoes, or chopped up and left to ferment. The starchy endosperm of the hard seeds is also consumed, and the base of the flower stalk is cooked and eaten as a vegetable.

In addition to being an important food plant, the Ethiopian banana is also used as livestock feed. The leaves provide thatch, umbrellas, mats and wrapping materials, as banana leaves do elsewhere in the tropics, and the leaf stalks yield fibres for cordage and sacking. The only part of the plant that is not used is the root. In East Africa the large black seeds are used as beads and threaded to create necklaces and rosaries.

Millennium Seed Bank: Seed storage

Kew's Millennium Seed Bank Partnership aims to save plant life world wide, focusing on plants under threat and those of most use in the future. Seeds are dried, packaged and stored at a sub-zero temperature in our seed bank vault.

Description of seeds: Very hard, black, variable in size (1.2-2.3 x 1.2-1.8 x 0.9-1.6 cm) and shape from nearly spherical to flattened and irregular, surface deeply striate (grooved) to almost smooth.

Number of seed collections stored in the Millennium Seed Bank: One collection of 1,145 seeds.

Seed storage behaviour: Orthodox (the seeds of this plant survive drying without significant reduction in their viability, and are therefore amenable to long-term frozen storage such as at the MSB)

Ethiopian banana at Kew

Ensete ventricosum 'Maurellii' can be seen growing in theTemperate House. Other specimens of E. ventricosum are held in the behind-the-scenesTropical Nursery, the garden ofCambridge Cottage and the Orange Room atWakehurst.

Pressed and dried specimens of E. ventricosum are held in the Herbarium, one of the behind-the-scenes areas of Kew. The details, including images, of some of these can be seen online in the Herbarium Catalogue.

The Economic Botany Collection contains samples of the seeds, fibre and an alcohol distiller made from parts of the Abyssinian banana.

Distribution

Ethiopia

Ecology

Swamp margins, river banks and open, moist mountain forests, in cultivation in Ethiopia.

Conservation

Not yet assessed according to IUCN Red List criteria.

Hazards

None known.

Distribution

Biogeografic region: Andean. Elevation range: 1500–2600 m a.s.l. Cultivated in Colombia. Colombian departments: Antioquia, Bogotá DC, Cundinamarca.

Habit

Herb.

Conservation

IUCN Red List Assessment (2021): LC.

Ecology

Habitat according IUCN Habitats Classification: forest and woodland, shrubland, artificial - terrestrial.

Musaceae, J.M. Lock. Flora of Tropical East Africa. 1993

Note

Is the basis of an agricultural system in southern Ethiopia.

Morphology General Habit

Giant herb arising from a short upright rhizome.

Morphology Stem

Pseudostem formed of the overlapping leaf-bases, 1.5-5 m. tall.

Morphology Leaves

Leaf-blades erect or spreading, forming a large rosette, oblong-lanceolate, to 5 × 1.5 m., glaucous or not, midrib red or green.

Morphology Reproductive morphology Inflorescences

Inflorescence appearing from the centre of the rosette, pendulous when mature.

Morphology Reproductive morphology Inflorescences Bracts

Bracts of the male part of the inflorescence persistent or partially deciduous, each subtending ± 30-40 flowers. Bracts of the female/hermaphrodite  part of the inflorescence persistent, partially covering the fruits.

sex Male

Bracts of the male part of the inflorescence persistent or partially deciduous, each subtending ± 30-40 flowers. Outer tepal of male flowers 3-lobed, the lobes variable in length, 3.5-5.5 cm. long, white with orange-yellow tips; inner tepal serrate-apiculate, 1-1.5 × 1-1.7 cm., the apiculum 0.3-1.3 cm., or occasionally absent; stamens 5, 3-5 cm. long, anthers violet to purple, filaments white; staminode present or not, acicular, 0.1-1 cm. long; style acicular, 1-2 cm. long.

Morphology Reproductive morphology Flowers

Outer tepal 3-lobed, sometimes with 1-2 smaller extra acicular lobes attached to it internally; inner tepals 1-3, variable in shape with 2 wings and an apiculum up to 1.5 cm. long; stamens 0-5, 3.5 cm. long, coloured as in the male flowers; staminodes variable according to the number of stamens present; style 2.5-4 cm. long, terete, with a large capitate stigma. Outer tepal of male flowers 3-lobed, the lobes variable in length, 3.5-5.5 cm. long, white with orange-yellow tips; inner tepal serrate-apiculate, 1-1.5 × 1-1.7 cm., the apiculum 0.3-1.3 cm., or occasionally absent; stamens 5, 3-5 cm. long, anthers violet to purple, filaments white; staminode present or not, acicular, 0.1-1 cm. long; style acicular, 1-2 cm. long.

sex Female and Hermaphrodite

Outer tepal 3-lobed, sometimes with 1-2 smaller extra acicular lobes attached to it internally; inner tepals 1-3, variable in shape with 2 wings and an apiculum up to 1.5 cm. long; stamens 0-5, 3.5 cm. long, coloured as in the male flowers; staminodes variable according to the number of stamens present; style 2.5-4 cm. long, terete, with a large capitate stigma. Bracts of the female/hermaphrodite  part of the inflorescence persistent, partially covering the fruits.

Morphology Reproductive morphology Fruits

Fruits 5-20 in the axil of each bract, long-obovoid, 8-15 × 3-4.5 cm., orange at maturity.

Morphology Reproductive morphology Seeds

Seeds irregularly subspherical, 1.2-2.3 × 1.2-1.8 × 0.9-1.6 cm., striate to smooth, hard, black, embedded in orange pulp.

Figures

Fig. 1.

Habitat

Disturbed places in upland forest, often in ravines and on steep slopes, or in swamps and on river banks, but also sometimes in drier lowland forests; 900-2250 m.

Distribution

K3 K4 K5 T2 T3 T4 T6 T7 U1 U2 U4 poorly represented in herbaria because of the difficulty of making collectionsEthiopia and Cameroon south to Angola and South Africa (Transvaal)

Bernal, R., G. Galeano, A. Rodríguez, H. Sarmiento y M. Gutiérrez. 2017. Nombres Comunes de las Plantas de Colombia. http://www.biovirtual.unal.edu.co/nombrescomunes/

Vernacular

plátano de Abisinia