GASTRONOMIC EXCELLENCES OF THE LAND: THE CANARIAN BANANA, an identity sign.

When the breeding of woodhouse dissapeared in the second half of the XIX century, the Canaries fill into a crisis that caused the search of alternative crops – the banana and the tomato ones – and the extension of the potato plantations, traded by the strong English colony in the United Kingdom. However, in 1516, Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo, commented on the banana crops in the Canaries.

Gran Canaria was one of the islands where the banana business had the greatest interest and its intensive production was located in the northern region – Arucas, Gáldar, Guía and the main city – thanks to the suitable conditions of the lands next to the sea.

In Tenerife it concentrated in the lands fit for the subtropical agriculture, like the one of the Orotava Valley. Afterwards it spreaded out in La Palma, where nowadays it constitutes the main crop, an to La Gomera, though in a less importance.

The sector reached its greatest extension in the middle of the XX century, when as a consequence of the economic poverty which the local population suffered, and as a coincidence with the stagnation of the exports, the banana became one of the main consumptio products. Nowadays, it still goes on being the first export product, promoted by the advertising campaing”Banana of the Canaries”, with the first productive regions in Tenerife, La Palma and Gran Canaria.