“Iceland is the king of the banana republics!” host Stephen Fry once declared confidently on the popular British game show “QI.”
That sounds implausible: Just look at the island nation’s pitted igneous landscape and brutal climate. But the claim isn’t as ridiculous as it sounds. A rumour has circulated for the last 60 years proclaiming Iceland to be the banana capital of Europe.
It’s not. But where did this rumour come from? Can Iceland even grow bananas? With average temperatures registering between 32 Fahrenheit in winter and a tepid 50 at the height of summer, Iceland’s climate seems most suitable for growing mould and frostbite.
But Iceland’s secret to agricultural innovation lies beneath the surface — way beneath.
Iceland’s banana plantation sits atop a 5,000 year-old lava field some 27 miles east of Reykjavíc at the Agricultural University of Iceland in Hveragerði, though perhaps the title plantation is slightly grandiose. At around 11,000 square feet in size — less than a quarter the size of a football field — this single greenhouse holds all of Iceland’s banana plants.
Built in the late 1940s, this tropical glass greenhouse is virtually indistinguishable from the hundreds of others like it found all over the island. Water drips from the ceiling, and every few minutes, the blisteringly hot pipes that run through the middle of the plant-rows noisily clunk and groan.