Matt Goff, age 9, of Hurricane, West Va., for his question:

DO BANANA PLANTS GROW FROM SEEDS?

A banana is one of our better food items. It is an extremely nourishing fruit that contains a good amount of vitamins A, B and C. Its peeling is germ proof and dirt proof. It is one of the few fruits which can be obtained fresh in your local market and in good condition at all times of the year. The banana grows in a number of warm countries throughout the world.

Bananas grow on plants, not trees. The banana plant can be from 10 to 25 feet tall. Although it may look like a tree, the banana plant isn't because it has no woody trunk or boughs.

Bananp plants do not grow from seeds, but rather develop from shoots that grow out of the roots of mature banana plants.

Here's how the reproduction works:

Growers replant young shoots that develop after a mature plant has produced a bunch of fruit. The young trees grow to full size after 12 to 15 months.

What looks like the trunk of a banana tree is made up of long leafstalks which are wrapped tightly together in a long, stiff bundle. When each new leaf appears at the top of the trunk, it is rolled up tightly like a long green cucumber. It unrolls as it grows and finally comes to look like a giant drooping feather, from one to two feet wide and from six to 10 feet long. Each new leaf makes the stalk of the plant grow taller.

After a year or so of growth the plant sends out a huge bud at the end of a strong, thick stalk. The bud holds lots of purple bracts, which are small leaves that hold flowers.

As the    stalk continues to grow, the bracts roll back,    revealing row    of small flowers inside. Some of these flowers turn into green bananas. As the bud sheds    the bracts along the stalk, the stalk becomes heavier and droops toward the ground.  When the plant  matures completely, the bud falls to the ground.

A banana plant dies after bearing one bunch of fruit. It then becomes necessary for the growers to start new plants by replanting the shoots produced by the roots of an old plant.

Before 1860, most of the banana crop was consumed at home instead oif being exported. Then the large commercial banana plantations were created and there were enough bananas for the whold world.

In building banana plantations, it was necessary in many cases to clear away entire jungles. The companies which developed the plantations in Latin American countries play an important part in the economics of the various countries.

Brazil is the world's leading banana growing country followed by Ecuador, `India, Indonesia and Honduras.