Common name: Abyssinian banana

Originating in the highlands of East Africa, this banana-like herb is cultivated for its corms, which yield an edible starch used for making a type of flatbread and porridge.

It is typically 5 to 10 m (16 to 32 ft) tall and is similar in appearance to the Banana (Musa acuminata), with a straight, succulent trunk and large banana-like leaves. However, it does not have suckering habit, so it does not form clumps of stems as the banana does.

The leaves are large and showy, 3 to 5 m (10 to 16 ft) long with a pink to purplish midrib and dark green or purple-tinged leaf-blades, depending on the variety. They arch steeply upward in a fountain-like display.

The flowers are creamy-white with a single petal, arranged in multi-fingered clusters at the base of a large purple bract. Overlapping bracts form a tightly packed cone-shape, held at the end of a long, pendant flower stalk.

Flowers are produced only once when the plant is around four to five years old. At the end of flowering, yellow, banana-like fruit develop with dry, inedible pulp embedded with numerous pea-sized black seed.

Use

Abyssinian banana produces a large underground corm that can be more than 50 cm (1.6 ft) in diameter when the plant reaches maturity. The corm and the swollen stem at the base of the plant are high in starch and are cooked as a vegetable in the Ethiopian highlands, where it is native.

The starch is low in protein and fat but higher in calcium than most other starchy root vegetables. Traditional foods prepared using the starch include 'Kocho', a fermented dough-like mass used as the base for a traditional flatbread known as 'Injera', and 'Bula', a porridge prepared with milk.

Abyssinian Banana is occasionally cultivated as an ornamental banana-look-alike, usually outside its native range in warm temperate and Mediterranean climates, either as a stand-alone specimen, poolside plant or as a tall shade or privacy screen in closely spaced plantings.

Climate

Grows naturally in moderately humid subtropical and tropical high-elevation climates, generally areas with annual lows of 8 to 22°C, annual highs of 19 to 30°C, annual rainfall of 700 to 2000 mm and a dry season of 3 months or less, extending to drier areas with irrigation.

Growing

Its propagation is challenging because it does not produce suckers like the Banana (Musa acuminata) does. A common practice is to grow new plants from corms trimmed of their stems to induce bud formation. The newly formed buds are then carefully removed to be planted out as new plants. 

Performs best on free-draining clay-loam loam, sandy-loam and loamy-sand soils of a moderately acid to slightly alkaline nature, generally with a pH 5.0 to 7.5, and on sites with full to partial sun exposure. It has poor tolerance to permanently wet or waterlogged soils.

Problem features

There does not appear to be any records of escape and naturalisation anywhere, despite its widespread introduction and cultivation as an ornamental in areas outside of its natural range.

Books

• Dharani, N. 2011, Field guide to common trees & shrubs of East Africa, 2nd ed., Struik Nature Publishing, Cape Town

• Elevitch, C. R. 2006, Traditional trees of Pacific Islands: their culture, environment and use, 1st edition, Permanent Agriculture Resources, Holualoa, Hawaii

• Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) 1988, Traditional food plants : a resource book for promoting the exploitation and consumption of food plants in arid, semi-arid and sub-humid lands of eastern Africa, Food and Nutrition Paper No. 42, Rome

• Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. Food Policy and Nutrition Division 1989, Utilization of tropical foods: trees, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Rome

• Hanson, B. 2007, Buried treasures : tasty tubers of the world : how to grown and enjoy root vegetables, tubers, rhizomes, and corms, Brooklyn Botanic Garden, Brooklyn, New York

• Mollison, B. 1993, The permaculture book of ferment and human nutrition, Tagari Publications, Tyalgum, New South Wales

• Morgan, D. & Achilleos, A. 2012, Roots : the definitive compendium with more than 225 recipes, Chronicle Books, San Francisco

• National Research Council (Board on Science and Technology for International Development) 2006, Lost Crops of Africa: Volume II: Vegetables, The National Academies Press, Washington D.C.

• Perry, B. 2010, Landscape plants for California gardens: an illustrated reference of plants for California landscapes, Land Design Publishing, Claremont, California

• Smith, P. P. 2018, The book of seeds : a life-size guide to six hundred species from around the world, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago

• Van Wyk, B. E. 2005, Food plants of the world: an illustrated guide, 1st ed., Timber Press, Portland, Oregon