Breadfruit: The Intrepid Fruit's Journey with Indigenous Peoples and Colonization
Breadfruit is adapted to a wide variety of climates and conditions in equatorial lowlands. Breadfruit trees require a mean annual rainfall between 1000-3000mm of rainfall per year. Depending on the cultivar, it can also tolerate sandy soils on rocky atolls. Breadfruit trees provide habitat and food for many pollinators and seed dispersers like bees, bats and birds (“Breadfruit History,” n.d.).
Breadfruit trees are a single-trunked tree with a spreading, evergreen canopy. Their trunk is straight and cylindrical and can be 1.8 m in diameter. Breadfruit trees vary in height: some reach up to 70 feet (21 m) at maturity but most are commonly 40-50 feet (12-15 m). The leaves also vary in shape; they can be broadly obovate or broadly ovate. Likewise, the leaves are deeply cut into seven or nine pointed lobes. The size of the leaf can range from 15-60 cm long and 25-50 cm wide. The blade is typically leathery and dark green. The veins can be green or yellow-green. The roots of breadfruit trees are spreading and grow on or slightly below the ground. Some varieties can develop buttress roots.
Breadfruit trees are monoecious with both the male and female flowers on the same tree. The male flowers are club shaped, and the female flowers are thousands of small flowers with 2 anthers around a spongy core. The flowers fuse together to form the breadfruit. The plants can be cross pollinated but it is not required for the fruit to form. The fruits vary in size, shape and texture depending on the variety. In general the fruit’s skin is compounded into small 5-7 sided discs that were once the flowers. Throughout their range, breadfruit have a great morphological variety of seeds. Varieties have different amounts of seeds, with many that have mostly aborted seeds, some seedless, and others are filled with seeds. The seeds can be found embedded in the pulp with dark brown seed coats and they don't have an endosperm. The seeds aren’t viable for very long; they germinate immediately.
Breadfruit trees thrive in humid tropics and can grow in a variety of soils. A. atilis first originated in the South Pacific and was later spread throughout Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia by voyagers. Pacific Islander voyagers cultivated breadfruit trees on different islands using the root shoots and seeds of breadfruit trees (National Tropical Botanical Garden, n.d.). They are typically grown around homes in villages and towns (Ragone, 2006). Later, Polynesian varieties of breadfruit were introduced to the Caribbean in the late 1700s by colonizers. Now, breadfruit is grown in almost 90 countries. Breadfruit seeds are viable and germinate while in the fruit, so preservation is not an option. Breadfruit can be propagated in multiple ways, tissue culture, seeds, and most commonly cuttings. Breadfruit is more commonly vegetatively propagated using root shoots or root cuttings. Vegetative propagation is when a new plant is produced from vegetative parts of the original plant; the new plant will contain the genetic material of the original, thus you can reproduce plants with the same desirable traits. Propagation by root shoots is when new breadfruit trees grow from the root system of the original then are detached from the mother tree. Root cuttings can be planted into the soil and grow into a new breadfruit tree (Ragone, 2006). In the right conditions, trees can flower and fruit in three to five years (Breadfruit, n.d.).
Breadfruit has been a dietary staple in the Pacific islands and the Caribbean — it contains complex carbohydrates and low levels of protein and fat. Although breadfruit contains low levels of protein, it provides all essential amino acids (histidine, isoleucine, leucine, methionine, phenylalanine, threonine, tryptophan, and valine). In general, breadfruit is a good source of dietary fiber, iron, calcium, magnesium, potassium, and phosphorus. Breadfruit also contains small amounts of thiamin, riboflavin, and niacin, with some varieties containing folic acid (National Tropical Botanical Garden, n.d.). There is diversity in the nutritional content of breadfruit but overall, breadfruit is nutritionally complete, providing the recommended values of carbohydrates, protein, fat, vitamins, and minerals (Jones et al., 2011). The fruit can be cooked and eaten at all stages of maturity but is typically eaten at its mature, starchy stage when used as a potato substitute. Breadfruit can be cooked in many different ways: steaming, boiling, frying, microwaving, grilling, and barbecuing are a few examples. Otherwise, the fruit can only be eaten raw when it is soft and ripe. The seed is also edible when cooked.
In addition, breadfruit is thought to have medicinal properties. For example, breadfruit leaves are prepared as a tea in the West Indies and is used to control diabetes, reduce high blood pressure, and relieve asthma. Its diluted latex can also be consumed, in the Pacific Islands, it’s believed that the diluted latex of breadfruit treats diarrhea, stomachaches, and dysentery when taken internally (National Tropical Botanical Garden, n.d.).
The Breadfruit was isolated in the Pacific for thousands of years before it caught the eye of Joseph Banks Botanist and enslaver. Breadfruit was brought to the Caribbean in the late 1700’s after two attempts. The first voyage to bring breadfruit to the Caribbean ended in an infamous mutiny (Bellrock. Org). In the second attempt the saplings from Tahiti were delivered to islands like Barbados and Jamaica, where they were planted at botanical gardens and sugar plantations to provide low-cost, low-effort food to the enslaved. (Braun, 2019). When the fruit was brought to the Caribbean, enslaved Africans didn’t really like the breadfruit, despite this, breadfruit eventually became a staple food in the Caribbean, where it was first fried and given a variety of new uses (“Breadfruit,” 2021).
Breadfruit has been an essential food source for Pacific Islanders for over 3,000 years because breadfruit trees do not require lots of maintenance — they can be planted once and continue to provide fruit for more than 50 years. Breadfruit cultivation provides a potential solution to food insecurity and shortage. Approximately 80% of the world’s hungry live in tropical and subtropical regions which have the ecological conditions suitable for cultivating breadfruit. (National Tropical Botanical Garden, n.d.). The Breadfruit Institute at the National Tropical Garden in Hawaii has formed partnerships with other organizations and is engaged in an initiative to respond to global food security issues. The Institute has more than 300 breadfruit trees conserved in their living collection. The Institute and their partners have been able to micropropagate breadfruit trees and send them to tropical countries worldwide More than 100,000 breadfruit trees have been sent to 44 countries since the launch of the Global Hunger Initiative in 2009.
Another study sought to find an “elite” cultivar by evaluating protein and mineral content, fruit morphology, and flour production (Jones et al., 2011). Breadfruit flour was found to have a significantly higher concentration of calcium, iron, potassium, and magnesium than unfortified refined wheat, rice and corn flour. However, cultivars of breadfruit contain differing amounts of nutrients. Moreover, staple crops – such as rice, corn and wheat – are commonly consumed around the world but require intensive labor and modern technologies to obtain adequate yields. Breadfruit is versatile and does not require as much labor, technologies, fertilization, or pest control. Therefore, the study calls for the proper cultivar selection of breadfruit to increase its nutritional value, which in turn has the potential to combat food insecurity and nutrient deficiencies.
The National Tropical Botanical Garden also established the Breadfruit Institute in 2003 in hopes of promoting the study of breadfruit for agroforestry, reforestation, and economic development. Unlike other cereals which are planted in monoculture systems, breadfruit is a key component in traditional agroforestry-based cropping systems. The U.S. Department of Agriculture defines agroforestry as “the intentional integration of trees and shrubs into crop and animal farming systems to create environmental, economic, and social benefits.” Agroforestry systems have been demonstrated to improve climate and food security and promote the socioeconomic development of local farmers (Raj et al., 2022). Agroforestry practices are not widespread but there are initiatives to increase its scale and adoptability globally, especially breadfruit.
