Enset: Ethiopia’s “False Banana” and Its Untapped Global Potential

Enset, a giant herb of the banana family native to Ethiopia’s southwestern highlands, feeds more than 20 million people. Farmers grow it at elevations of 1,500–3,000 m, harvesting the pseudostem and underground corm, fermenting the pulp to produce the bread-like staple kocho and the powdered by-product bulla. The plant’s fruits are inedible, earning it the nickname “false banana.”

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Enset’s cultivation is confined to a 300-km region where it has been a cultural mainstay for centuries. Ethiopia strictly regulates the export of plant material to guard against biopiracy; a 2019 legal dispute over Dutch patents on teff heightened national caution. Kew Gardens was allowed to import two enset plants in 2019 under the condition that all material be destroyed after research.

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• Yield: About 60 enset plants can sustain a family of five for a year.

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• Modeling Study (2021): Co-authored by James Borrell, the study projected that expanding current enset-suitable areas twelve-fold could feed up to 111.5 million additional people across sub-Saharan Africa.

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• 2025 Survey: Roughly 60 % of more than 400 southwestern farmers reported reducing the area devoted to enset and a decline in household consumption.

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Enset is drought-tolerant, disease-resistant, and perennial, allowing it to remain productive for years without replanting. Its broad climatic tolerance makes it a candidate for diversification in regions facing rising food insecurity and climate volatility.

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While modeling suggests vast expansion possibilities, no field-scale trials outside Ethiopia have been documented in the sources. Data on actual yields, farmer uptake, and market development in other African nations remain absent, leaving a gap between theoretical potential and practical implementation.

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• “In terms of being generalist and adaptable, it’s amazing,” — James Borrell, uk-based conservation biologist

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• “There’s lots of examples in history of crops arriving in new places and being dominant,” — James Borrell, uk-based conservation biologist

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• “When a crop is as successful as enset, in a small area, it spreads around the world — maize, rice, potatoes,” — James Borrell, uk-based conservation biologist

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• “Ethiopia’s got plant diversity, and so they’re very protective of it,” — James Borrell, uk-based conservation biologist

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• “Before our work, people didn’t want to grow enset … That’s a loss for the world, not just for Ethiopia,” — James Borrell, uk-based conservation biologist

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