Panama disease in stress-tolerance, yield, or other beneficial traits necessary for commercial varieties. Nevertheless, these efforts are leading to the best control measure for Panama disease of banana. Recently, an R gene (RGA2) was transformed into Cavendish bananas which confers disease resistance to Fusarium wilt tropical race 4. This is the first case of successful resistance in the field and is a promising step towards preventing the loss of the Cavendish cultivars that are a huge portion of banana export production and subsistence of many communities. One major impediment to breeding bananas is polyploidy; Gros Michel and Cavendish bananas are triploid and
Canada–Panama Free Trade Agreement 99% of its tariffs on goods from Panama. Canada will keep tariffs on some imports of sugar, poultry, eggs and dairy products. Panama will end its ban on beef from Canada which was initiated after cases of mad cow disease were found in Canada in 2003. In 2008, bilateral merchandise trade between Canada and Panama totaled $149.1 million. Trade has increased by 48 percent from 2007. Canada made up $127.9 million of total trade between the two countries, while Panama made up the remaining $21.2 million. Both countries parliament needed to approve the agreement before it could come into force.