WORLD ANIMAL REVIEW

---

by J. Le Dividich, F. Geoffroy, I. Canope and M. Chenost

As world demand for milk and
meat increases, competition in the use
of crops for human food and for animal
feeding is becoming more intense.
World grain production, for example,
has declined in recent years, and in
consequence stocks have been depleted
and prices have risen to such
a high level that it is becoming uneconomic
to continue feeding grain
to livestock as generously as in the
past. Thus there is more reason
now than ever before, particularly in
the tropical regions where animal
protein for human consumption is
scarce, to make use of every crop or
by-product that could serve as animal
feed.

J. Le Dividich is a researcher with
the Swine Breeding Research Station
at the National Centre for Zootechnical
Research (CNRZ) of the National
Institute for Agricultural Research
(INRA) in Jouy-en-Josas,
France.

F. Geoffroy and I. Canope are researchers
at the INRA Zootechnical
Research Station in Antilles-Guyane,
Petit-Bourg, Guadeloupe.

M. Chenost is an Animal Nutrition
Officer with the Animal Production
and Health Division of FAO in
Rome, Italy

While direct feeding of sugarcane
to cattle is now well established
(Leng and Preston, 1976), the feeding
of bananas, another important tropical
crop in terms of volume and energy
value, has been relatively neglected.
This is largely because bananas
are principally a human food,
but is also partly attributable to the
fact that their value as animal feed
has not been adequately considered
(Chenost et al., 1969; FAO, 1969).

It is relevant to note in this context
that according to the Institut français
de recherches fruitières d’Outre-Mer
(IFAC), for every ton of bananas
packed and exported to the fruit
markets of the world, about 750 kg
are rejected as being either unsuitable
or in excess of requirements.
This discarded fruit represents 10 to
20 percent of the total crop, the variation
depending on how culling is
done during packing (which depends
on the market), and the amount of
fruit that is rendered unusable by
fortuitous circumstances such as
gales and hurricanes.

Of the 36 million-ton world banana
production (FAO, 1975), it may be
estimated that 7 to 10 million tons
per year (20 to 30 Percent) could be
recovered as animal feed. But of
this, a substantial quantity is either
used in a haphazard way or lost to
the animal industry.

The purpose of this article is to
review what is currently known about
the use of waste bananas as animal
feed and to consider areas of study
warranting further attention.

Composition and ensiling
properties

The composition of all banana varieties
harvested is determined chiefly
by degree of ripeness. Table 1 shows
the composition of the green and
ripe fruit.

Bananas have a high water content
(78 to 80 percent). In the green state
in which they are generally picked
and packed, the dry matter consists
mainly of starch (72 percent), which
on ripening changes into simple sugars
(saccharose, glucose and fructose).
The cellulose content is low (3 to 4
percent) and most of it is found in
the skin. The inorganic fraction is
poor in the more important minerals,
Ca and P, but is rich in Potassium.

Whether green or ripe, the banana
has a low protein content (N × 6.25)
and is deficient in lysine and in
sulphur-containing amino acids (2.3–
2.9 g/16 g N). Moreover, the banana
contains tannins which are only
slightly polymerized in the green fruit
and which therefore inhibit the action
of enzymes. In the ripe fruit, however,
there is higher polymerization.

Because of its high fermentable
sugar content, the banana is easy to
ensile. On the basis of work done
recently in Guadeloupe (Sève et al.,
1972; Le Dividich and Geoffroy,
1973; and Le Dividich et al., 1976)
it may be concluded that the ensiling
of bananas can be successfully undertaken
if the normal rules of silage
making are observed, ensuring adequate
compaction and drainage; no
additives are required. Ripe bananas
compact easily, but bananas to be
ensiled green should be chopped.
Alternatively, green bananas may be
ripened either naturally or artificially
in an acetylene atmosphere (a procedure
developed by IFAC at its Guadeloupe
Station) prior to ensiling. In
silage made from green bananas the
starch keeps well (with losses of only
6 to 7 percent), whereas 84 percent
of the simple sugars of the ripe bananas
are either degraded or disappear.
As a result, weight losses
(Table 1) are almost three times less
for green banana silage (10 to 15 percent)
than for silage from ripe bananas
(30 to 35 percent).

The silage stabilizes in three to
four days and keeps for at least six
months. The characteristics of silage
from ripe fruit (e.g. pH and lactic
acid content) may be more favourable
than those of silage from green
bananas. But on balance green banana
silage is to be preferred, particularly
when sudden peaks occur in
banana supplies owing to seasonal
factors, market constraints and meteorological
conditions.

Use in pig feeding

Fresh Bananas. The digestible
energy (DE) value of the green banana
(Table 2), measured with pigs of
40 kg average weight; is 3 181 kcal/kg
of dry matter (i.e. 80 to 86 percent
that of maize). This value may be
improved by:

1. cooking, which considerably increases
   the efficiency in vitro of
   amylase in starch digestion (Beroard-Cerning
   and Le Dividich. 1976):
2. peeling, which causes an 8 percent
   improvement in DE, but is of
   little practical value because the improvement
   obtained is offset by a 20
   percent loss of dry matter:
3. ripening the fruit (Table 2).

Alpine goats eating fresh green chopped bananas

Table 1. Composition of banana export rejects at different stages of maturity and preservation

	Green 3 to 5 days after picking	Ensiled green	Ripe	Ensiled ripe
Physical composition	Percentage of dry matter
Banana peelings	20		18
Banana pulp	80		82
Chemical composition	Percent
Dry matter content in fresh feed	21.2	29.0	21.7	23.5
Crude fibre1	3.7	5.3	3.8	6.1
Crude protein1	6.4	3.8	5.3	8.1
Sugars soluble in alcohol at 80° G.L.1	1.8	0	73.6	17.3
Starch1	72.3	70.9	3.4	6.8
Ash1	4.6	3.8	5.2	5.7
pH		4.2		3.8
Lactic acid (g/% DM)		5.3		10.1
Volatile acidity (g CH3 COOH/100 g DM)		1.8		3.0
Ethanol		0.2		2.3
Losses as percentage of ensiled dry matter		13.5		33.9

Table 2. Apparent digestibility and digestible energy content of fresh bananas for pigs

	Green raw	Whole cooked	Whole green peeled	Whole ripe
Digestibility coefficient	Percent
Dry matter	a83.5	b87.9	b88.6	b89.5
Organic matter	a84.2	b88.6	b89.1	b90.1
Energy	a79.5	b84.3	b85.5	b85.5
Nitrogen	a-19.0	b26.4	a-1.6	b38.4
Digestible energy	Kcal
Per kg dry matter	3 181	3 439	3 440	3 327
Per kg fresh weight	674	743	1 021	722

Adding bananas to a pig ration
reduces the digestibility of the total
nitrogen content of the ration (Le
Dividich and Canope, 1970). This
means that the digestibility of the
protein in bananas (Table 2) is either
negative (as in green bananas) or
very low (as in ripe bananas).

Thus for pigs fresh bananas are a
bulky feed of low energy value (about
700 kcal DE/kg, or 20 percent of the
energy value of maize). They also
depress the utilization of the nitrogen
in the ration. When including them
in pig diets it is therefore necessary
to provide both energy and nitrogen
supplementation.

Fresh green bananas may be fed
chopped into thin slices or crushed,
and when ripe may be offered whole.
Some authors (Viteri et al., 1970; Le
Dividich, [unpublished] and Shillingford,
1971) have found little influence
of the banana’s degree of ripeness on
animal growth performance, while
others stress the value of the less
astringent ripe banana, which is more
easily digested than the green fruit
and contributes to better growth.
Cooking the green fruit improves the
growth rate of pigs by 10 percent and
improves the nutritional efficiency of
diets, but is limited by cost.

In Guadeloupe studies on growing
pigs (27 to 54 kg live weight) raised
in cages and fed four diéts based on
bananas and soybean cake, with protein
contents ranging from 12.5 to
20.9 percent, gave the following results
(Le Dividich and Canope, 1975):

• Increased protein content significantly
  improved growth performance
  and feed conversion efficiency.




• Daily net nitrogen retention rose
  significantly (P<0.01) to a level corresponding
  to a 17.8 percent protein
  content in the diet; this resulted in
  the recommendation that for growing
  pigs, the diets should contain 18 percent
  crude protein. Because of the
  quantities of banana ingested, a daily
  supplement of 270 g protein is necessary.
  This is in accord with the
  results of Galles, Clavijo and Maner
  (1969) and Oliva, Gelleri and Maner
  (1970) for green and ripe bananas.

(Above) Ensiling fresh green bananas in Guadeloupe. There have been significant improvements in the milk production and weight gains of ruminants fed bananas in compound feeds or as a supplement to green forages.
(Right) Crossbred Creole × Large White pigs eating fresh green chopped bananas. As fresh bananas are a bulky feed of low energy value and depress digestibility of the total nitrogen content of a pig ration, it is necessary to provide both energy and nitrogen supplementation.

Table 3. Effect of level of concentrates in banana-based rations on the growth performance of pigs (25 to 95 kg live weight)

		Lot
		1	2	3
Daily feed intake
Concentrate for pigs weighing 28 to 60 kg
Amount fed	kg	0.9	1.2	1.5
Digestible energy	kcal	2 952	3 996	4 995
Crude protein	g	268	271	269
Concentrate for pigs weighing 60 to 95 kg
Amount fed	kg	1.1	1.4	1.7
Digestible energy	kcal	3 646	4 690	5 689
Crude protein	g	341	344	342
Bananas		Kg
Fresh weight		a4.63	b4.13	b3.49
Dry matter		a0.99	b0.89	c0.75
Total dry matter intake		a1.90	b2.04	c2.16
Growth performance
Average daily weight gain	g	a515	b589	c624
Feed conversion ratio (kg dry matter/kg weight gain)		a3.70	a3.63	b3.47
Carcass yield
Dressing percentage		a70.2	a71.3	b72.9
Weight of digestive tract, full	kg	a11.4	ab10.2	b9.5
Average backfat thickness	mm	a23.0	a24.8	b28.3

Adding fresh bananas (which are
high in water content and low in
energy) to pig diets results in an energy
deficit in the ration that may be
overcome in three ways:

1. By dehydration to increase energy
   concentration. This would make it
   possible to add 50 to 75 percent green
   banana flour to the ration (Oliva,
   Gelleri and Maner, 1970); however,
   the cost per kg of weight gain would
   increase because of the cost of dehydration.




2. By raising the intake of fresh bananas
   through ad libitum feeding.
   Le Dividich and Canope (1975)
   showed that under ad libitum feeding
   (with two feedings per day), a pig can
   increase its intake by 20 to 30 percent.
   However, carcass yield is lowered
   because of the enlarged digestive
   tract, and this limits the commercial
   advantage of a large intake of bananas.




3. By providing more feed supplements
   (Table 3). The supplementation
   would result in a linear increase
   in growth rate, an improvement in
   the feed conversion ratio and a higher
   carcass yield, but the level of fat in
   the carcass would be high.

In practice, the choice of feeding
systems or level of supplementation
is determined by economic considerations,
i.e. the price of the feed supplement
in relation to the added value
of the carcass.

Ensiled and dehydrated bananas.
The work done in Guadeloupe
shows that banana silage is
highly acceptable to the growing and
fattening pig (Table 4). Despite its
depressing effect on the digestibility
of the ration protein, green banana
silage has nearly the same food value
as the ripe fruit. On the other hand,
ripe banana silage makes for poor
growth performance because of its
higher cellulose content. Despite the
poor digestibility of the protein in
silage-based diets, the carcass is of
good quality even if animals are
slaughtered at weights of 100 kg or
more (Sève, Le Dividich and Canope,
1976).

Fresh or ensiled green bananas can
constitute a basic feed for the gestating
sow (Le Dividich and Canope,
1975). Farrowing performance (number
and average weight of piglets in
the litter) is not affected by the inclusion
of bananas in the ration. On
the other hand, even with a generous
supplement (1.0 kg of molasses +
1.5 kg of a feed containing 40 percent
protein), bananas do not cover all the
energy requirements of the lactating
sow. The 5-to 9-kg weight losses that
have been recorded indicate that the
use of bananas as feed for lactating
sows is not advisable. These conclusions
agree with those of Clavijo and
Maner (1969).

Table 4. Feeding value of diets based on fresh green bananas and banana silage for growing and finishing pigs (30 to 90 kg live weight)

		Diets
		A	B	C	D
Composition of feeds offered
Fresh green bananas		ad lib.	ad lib.	ad lib.	–
Control diet1		–	–	–	ad lib.
Raw cane sugar for pigs weighing 30 to 50 kg	g/day	400	400	400	–
Concentrate2 for pigs weighing 30 to 50 kg	g/day	600	600	600	–
Concentrate2 for pigs weighing 50 to 95 kg	g/day	900	900	900	–
Apparent digestibility		Percent
Dry matter		a84.0	b80.6	c76.6	b79.4
Nitrogen		a73.0	a71.1	b68.7	c83.5
Feed intake		Kg/day
Bananas		a4.60	b3.87	b3.93	–
Total dry matter intake		1.80	1.88	1.80	2.42
Growth performance
Average daily weight gain	g	a432	a434	a400	b631
Feed conversion ratio (kg dry matter/kg gain)		4.24	4.36	4.48	3.87
Carcass yield
Dressing percentage		a69.7	a69.7	a68.9	b71.8
Average backfat thickness	mm	a23.6	a25.8	a24.8	b30.6

Banana pulp flour (72.3 percent
starch, 1.2 percent crude fibre and
4.5 percent crude protein) was used
successfully in weaning feeds for
piglets at 5 weeks of age (Le Dividich
and Canope, 1974), and even at 3
weeks (Le Dividich [unpublished]).
When it comprised 50 percent of
the weaning feed, growth performance
was comparable to that obtained
with cassava flour. It also
facilitated keeping the animals in
excellent health (as noted by the lack
of diarrhoea), which is an important
consideration in the choice of weaning
feeds.

Thus, the use of fresh and ensiled
bananas in pig feeding contributes to
considerable savings in concentrate
feeds. Such savings may amount to
about 50 percent per pig slaughtered
at 95 kg live weight (with a good
lean carcass) and 75 percent per gestation
(without affecting farrowing
performance). However, fresh bananas
should not be used in early
weaning feeds because of the piglet’s
poor capacity to digest starch from
this source. On the other hand, flour
made from green bananas is well tolerated
by piglets when they weigh
5 kg or more.

Use in ruminant feeding

Only a limited amount of work has
been done on the use of bananas for
ruminant feeding.

Banana pulp flour. Bananas have
hitherto been used after dehydration
as a source of starch for the preparation
of calf feeds. The flour is used
in the manufacture of milk replacers
in substitution for lactose. However,
its use is restricted to particular situations.
It is known that preruminant
calves can be fed to high slaughter
weights if the lactose and some
of the fats are replaced by starches;
the substitution promotes protein
synthesis (Thivend et al., 1972). This
would suggest that at a time when the
use of cereals in animal feeds is being
increasingly questioned, banana flour
should find special favour as an ingredient
in calf feeds.

Some work has been done, notably
in Ecuador (Spiro, 1973; Rihs et al.,
1975), on the introduction of banana
flour into ruminant diets. Spiro demonstrated
that green banana flour
could replace 50 percent of the cereal
in feeds for young growing and finishing
cattle without changing their
intake and growth rates.

Fresh and ensiled bananas. The
conversion of bananas into flour is a
costly process and may be justified
only for preruminant calf feeding for
the production of veal, which represents
a luxury commodity. For milk
production or conventional meat production,
however, it is preferable
to use bananas with a minimum
of processing.

Table 5. Influence of different kinds of energy and nitrogen supplementation on feed intake and milk production in dairy goats

Energy source		Cereal		Green banana		Ensiled banana
Nitrogen source		Soybean cake	Soybean cake + urea	Soybean cake	Soybean cake + urea	Soybean cake	Soybea cake + urea
Level of urea (N as % total N)		(0)	(32.2)	(0)	(28.9)	(0)	(28.5)
Dry matter intake		g/day
Pangola (regrowth of 50 days)		679	686	176	321	319	330
Bananas		–	–	1 330	1 278	1 099	904
Concentrate		828	749	448	189	404	160
Total dry matter intake		a1 507	b1 435	c1 954	d1 788	d1 822	b1 394
Dry matter intake per 100 kg live weight	kg	3.14	3.34	4.17	3.26	3.67	3.24
Milk production	kg/day	1.627	b1.481	c2.028	a1.599	d1.878	b1.447
Butterfat content	g/kg	25.8	26.3	25.4	30.0	27.0	27.5
Concentrate/milk	g/kg	509	506	221	118	215	111

It was in this context that the work
carried out in Guadeloupe, and more
recently in Costa Rica, was geared
to the use of bananas either fresh or
ensiled. In these studies two approaches
were followed, one involving
the use of bananas as an energy
supplement to green forages, and the
other using bananas as a basic ingredient
of compound feeds that were
balanced with fibre, protein, mineral
and, where necessary, energy supplements.

1. Use as a supplement to green
forages. The first series of digestibility
trials conducted with goats in
cages (Chenost et al., 1971; Geoffroy
and Chenost, 1973; Chenost et al.,
1976) provided the following results:

• In ad libitum feeding, when forages
  and bananas were offered separately
  in the trough, the two feeds
  were ingested in such proportions
  that bananas constituted 20 to 40 percent
  of the total ingested dry matter.




• When bananas were blended with
  forages, it was found that the intake
  of both dry matter and digestible
  organic matter rose sharply with increasing
  content of bananas in the
  ration from 0 to 20 percent; dry matter
  intake was higher for ensiled than
  for fresh green bananas, with a peak
  of 1.8 to 2.2 kg/100 kg live weight
  at the 20 percent level. Beyond this
  level, dry matter intake remained relatively
  constant as bananas replaced
  green forage on a weight for weight
  basis, while digestible organic matter
  intake rose slowly.

The second series of trials conducted
in Guadeloupe (Geoffroy, [unpublished])
with lactating goats demonstrated
the feasibility of substituting
green and ensiled bananas for
all the cereals in concentrate feed.
The principal results were as follows
(Table 5):

• Total substitution of the cereals
  with bananas resulted in an increase
  in dry matter intake.




• Milk production was significantly
  higher in animals fed green bananas
  (whether fresh or ensiled) than in
  those fed cereals.




• The butterfat content remained
  low and was not affected by the diet.




• Weight gains were significantly
  higher in animals fed fresh or ensiled
  green bananas than in those receiving
  cereals.

The third series of trials with growing
goats (Table 6), also conducted
in Guadeloupe, showed that half of
the conventional concentrates could
be replaced with bananas if the ration
were supplemented with urea to
maintain its nitrogen level (Chenost
et al., 1971); the non-protein nitrogen
could constitute about 30 percent of
the total nitrogen in the ration.

For both milk production and finishing
purposes, bananas may be regarded
as a good substitute for barley.
This was demonstrated in Guadeloupe
by Poncet (1973), who also
observed that banana starch passed
into the intestine faster than barley
starch, that fermentation in the rumen
was less intense and more regular,
and that less volatile fatty acids
were released with banana rations
than with barley rations. The latter
observation is consistent with
the efficient utilization of urea in
both banana-based and barley-based
diets.

Table 6. Feed intake and performance of fattening kids receiving either Pangola grass
supplemented with cereals or bananas, or complete ensiled ration

		Pangola (ad libitum) diet				Silage diet
		+ concentrate	+ concentrate with 2.5% urea	+ limited concentrate +green bananas	+ limited concentrate +ensiled bananas	Banana Wheat bran Bagasse Urea	74% 22% 3% 1%
Growth performance
Initial weight	kg	27.3	27.5	27.6	27.8	13.0
Final weight	kg	33.8	34.8	33.6	34.7	35.1
Duration	days	56	56	56	70	156
Average daily weight gain	g	112	130	155	123	142
Dry matter intake		g/day
Roughage		156	198	139	171
Concentrate		616	616	308	308
Bananas		–	–	468	510
Total dry matter intake		772	814	915	989	776
Feed conversion ratio		6.7	6.2	5.9	8.0	5.3

Cubillos (1974) also used bananas
successfully in Costa Rica as a supplement
to green forages. Feeding
fresh bananas to steers that were
raised on grass made it possible to
increase stocking rate, the growth
rate of the animals and, in consequence,
the weight gain per hectare.

2. Use as a basic ingredient of complete
feeds. In order to simplify feed
mixing and feeding, a single feed
obtained by ensiling all the constituents
of the diet (bananas, bagasse,
bran and urea) was offered in Guadeloupe
to dairy goats and growing
kids. The principal results were as
follows (Geoffroy and Chenost, 1973;
Geoffroy, [unpublished]):

• The level of silage intake, which
  was relatively low (2.0 to 2.5 kg/100
  kg live weight), increased by 30 to
  40 percent when 5 percent molasses
  was added on a fresh weight basis.




• The performance obtained with
  this type of feed was promising; milk
  production was maintained and the
  growth rate of fattening kids was
  better than that observed with ordinary
  cereal-based diets (Table 6).

The results obtained from these
studies and applied research suggest
that the work begun should be continued
in depth. In particular, it
would be useful to determine the
way in which the different banana
preparations affect the digestive and
metabolic processes of pigs and ruminants.
On the basis of the results
obtained so far, bananas may be
considered a good energy source
for pigs, while in ruminants they are
potentially a good substrate for microbial
protein synthesis from nonprotein
nitrogen. This also appears
to be confirmed by the work of Herrera
and Ruiz (1976), where the substitution
of bananas for 50 percent
of the molasses in the supplementary
energy provided by sugarcane to finishing
bull calves resulted in accelerated
growth rates and an improvement
in feed conversion efficiency.

More generally, in the humid tropical
regions it would be interesting to
explore the prospects of using local
products or by-products in the compounding
of complete rations in
which the energy component could,
for example, be made up chiefly of
bananas, sugarcane and molasses,
and the protein component could
consist of urea and by-products from
the cereal milling industry. Sugarcane
could be included in proportions
that would vary with socio-economic
conditions. Adding bananas to sugarcane-based
silage could overcome the
problems of feed intake and the
unfavourable ratios of volatile fatty
acids for glucogenesis that were observed
by Leng and Preston (1976).

Conclusion

Surplus and discarded bananas are
a potential feed resource of great
quantitative and qualitative interest
in both pig and cattle production. In
practice they can be used to replace
the entire cereal component of pig
and dairy cattle feeds and probably
almost all of the cereals in cattle
finishing feeds.

The necessary techniques for feeding
bananas to pigs have already been
developed; it is only necessary to
disseminate them more widely and
adapt them to varying local conditions.
However, some further work
on feeding of bananas to cattle is
still necessary. In either case, it
should be recognized that because of
the difficulty of transporting fresh bananas
and the cost of dehydrating
them, it would be economical to use
them as animal feed only in the vicinity
of places where they are grown.
This limitation is likely to weaken
the possible geographical impact of
banana feeding. However, the geographical
restriction of use to the
producing areas is advantageous in
that trade in bananas suitable for
livestock feeding would be restricted
and would not lead to speculative
commercial ventures.

Effective local utilization of bananas
in livestock feeds would involve
the setting up of rearing and/or
finishing establishments in the vicinity
of banana-packing facilities; this will
have the highly beneficial effect of
contributing to greater specialization
in livestock breeding and finishing
operations.

References

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