In Hawaii, can breadfruit’s resurgence bring food security?
When Diane Ragone travels around the Hawaiian Islands these days, it’s not hard for her to spot breadfruit.
It is there in the farmers markets, knobby green fruit the size of a softball. It’s listed on menus as an ingredient in soufflés and nachos, flours and pastas. It is celebrated at festivals and studied by international scientists; it is served at food banks.
It is also growing on trees.
Some of these trees are in the National Tropical Botanical Garden, grown from specimens that Dr. Ragone has collected from across the Pacific, tended by the staff of the Breadfruit Institute, an organization she helped create 20 years ago. But
