Queensland bananas destined for landfill turned into superfood

Most Aussies take it for granted that they can have a banana whenever they want but a Queensland couple have shown this comes at a cost.

Krista and Robert Watkins used to be one of Far North Queensland’s biggest Lady Finger variety banana growers, but one steamy Friday afternoon eleven years ago, their lives changed forever.

“Rob was loading the truck and a cluster of bananas must have fallen out of one of the boxes. He drove over it with a forklift, and when he jumped out, he saw what looked to him like powder inside,” said Krista.

Barging through the kitchen door to show his wife his discovery, the pair found that the banana ‘flour’ didn’t actually taste like bananas at all.

“Rob told me to try it, and I actually don’t like the taste of bananas!” she laughs.

The pair started producing flour with their green bananas, and very quickly they realised they were onto something.

“People started ringing us saying ‘What’s this banana flour got in it? I had psoriasis and all these other gut issues and different medical things and now it’s gone. It has to be this, it’s only been since we started using your product’,” said Krista.

“That was probably when I had my mild freak out moment that something really huge is going on here.”

Queensland green bananas can be turned into a ‘superfood’.

The pair got in touch with food scientists and medical practitioners, and suddenly, they were aware they’d made a groundbreaking discovery.

“They wanted to know what on earth we had sent them. They said, ‘we’re an internationally accredited lab for testing resistant starch – and you’ve just sent us the richest source that anyone’s ever tested in the whole world’,” Krista said.

Resistant starch is touted as a dietary superfood that helps support a healthy digestive system and protect the gut against diseases.

“So it’s great for people with cholesterol issues, diabetes, all of that kind of stuff. We eventually registered the green banana resistant starch with the TGA for cholesterol, weight loss and diabetes help, and just recently it’s been published in the CSIRO diet book,” said Krista.

They started their company Natural Evolution and in 2017 they won a Gold Edison Award for their Neutral Lock Food Processing technology.

“It gives us the ability to take a banana or any produce and turn it into a powder in ten minutes,” said Krista.

Robert and Krista Watkins happened across banana flour after running over a green banana. Picture: Supplied.

But the Watkins family aren’t just driven by the health benefits – they’re also keen environmentalists on a mission to tackle the Far North’s farm waste. Today they don’t grow anything themselves. Instead, they purchase waste produce from local farmers.

“Last year we purchased over a million kilos of bananas that would’ve otherwise been thrown away.

As an example of the colossal waste issue in the banana industry, Krista mentioned that Robert’s old family farm wasted about 5000 kilograms of green bananas every week.

“About 500 metric ton of bananas are thrown away every week in North Queensland. But of course in summertime when bananas move quickly, there’s a lot more. The only thing that is usually wrong with it [waste product] is that it might be too small or too big for supermarkets,” she said.

“We work just with a handful of farms because they have so much available product to us. We really love what we do. And we’ve got so much respect for everything that farmers have to go through to produce this beautiful product.”

Around 500 metric ton of bananas are thrown away every week in North Queensland. Picture: Supplied.

But food waste doesn’t just haunt our farms – business and household waste is a rife issue, too, and Forkful is trying to fix that.

Natalie Sarau’s partner, Simone Marini, is a national sales manager in the food service space. When they realised how enormous the issue of waste was in the industry, the pair were inspired to make a change.

“About 324,000 tons of food is wasted annually from our food service sector, just in Australia. And when you consider that the average meal is only 500 grams, we’re pretty much throwing away 660 million meals,” said Natalie.

“It’s huge, it’s monumental. But it also impacts our economy – our businesses are essentially paying about $4.7 billion for food that they end up throwing in the bin. About 70 per cent of food that ends up in landfill is actually edible.”

Natalie Sarau started Forkful to help end food waste. Picture: Supplied.

Enter, Forkful. Inspired by Europe’s eager technological approach to food waste, Natalie and Simone are on a mission to connect consumers to delicious surplus unsold food in Australia.

Across the world, apps like Forkful have been making waves in food waste. As an example, Denmark-based Too Good to Go has saved 112 million meals since 2016.

“We first experienced apps like this in Sweden in 2019, it was just so advanced and we didn’t know anything like this was happening in Australia. Just mind blowing,” she said.

With trials set to begin in February, Forkful is aiming to launch in Melbourne to consumers in April.

“A customer can use Forkful by geographic location to see what’s available and where, and then buy it on our platform and head straight to the venue to collect their takeaway,” Natalie said.

Forkful in launching in Melbourne in February. Picture: Supplied.

With plans to spread across Australia in the near future, the pair are also keen to start educating businesses about the food waste issue.

“One of the biggest things we’ve learned is that we can help businesses be sustainable without any effort on their part – they don’t have to change what they’re doing!” she said.

But Natalie says their app aims to change consumer mindsets on food waste, too.

“We’re also going to create content for consumers, for people at home to make smarter decisions. For example, how to save your fruit and veggies or create recipe ideas with wilted carrots and so on,” said Natalie.

“For example, I recently bought strawberries on sale and made a beautiful strawberry sorbet with them. It’s just about getting out of our old habits.”

For Natalie and Simone, parenthood was the catalyst for learning to care for the world around them.

“It’s a terrifying spot when you realise that if we don’t change the way we’re living now, what sort of future are we leaving our kids?” Natalie said.

With about 23 Melbourne venues signed up as part of Forkful’s trial, Victorian folk who are interested in learning more about the program can jump onto their website to nab a $5 credit voucher for the launch.

Imogen Kars is a freelance writer.

This content is created in sponsorship with Volvo.

Originally published as Queensland bananas destined for landfill turned into superfood