Tenerife’s Noah’s Ark for Fruit Trees Secures Major Investment
The Island Council of Tenerife is making a significant investment to conserve the ‘Noah’s Ark’ of the Canary Islands’ fruit trees. The Las Llanadas estate in Los Realejos is the largest plot for conserving this type of cold-climate tree in the entire archipelago. The island government, through the Primary Sector Department, will allocate €600,000 to this agricultural land, which acts as a “living gene bank” for apple, pear, plum and other pip and stone fruit trees. The maintenance of the plots will be carried out by the public company Tragsa.
A Living Gene Bank of Unique Varieties
The Las Llanadas estate is home to more than 100 varieties of fruit trees. These species are unique to Tenerife and “were on the verge of disappearing”. This land, located in the mid-altitude areas of this northern Tenerife municipality, covers 25,000 square metres. It had fallen into disuse and was recovered at the beginning of 2023. Las Llanadas is now used for morphological and genetic studies and to ‘duplicate’ collections of fruit trees. “In other words, it holds backup copies of plants that are in other areas, thus preventing a pest or disaster from wiping out a unique variety,” officials explained in a statement.
A Long-Term Project and a Centre of Reference
The improvement and maintenance project at the Los Realejos estate will run until 2029. The Councillor for the Primary Sector of the Tenerife Island Council, Valentín González, described Las Llanadas as “the largest cold-climate fruit tree conservation estate in the Canary Islands”. Since its recovery began, the island government has invested over one million euros in Las Llanadas to turn it into “a centre of reference”, they explained. Furthermore, the Los Realejos plot is linked to the Tenerife Agricultural Biodiversity Conservation Centre (Ccbat) for the ‘ex situ’ (outside the laboratory) conservation of many pip and stone fruit trees.
Substantial Infrastructure Improvements
Approximately two years ago, the Las Llanadas estate was equipped with facilities including a storage warehouse, cold room, phytosanitary products room, drying sheds, sanitary facilities (toilets and changing rooms), as well as a small office and a meeting room. A specific module was also created for training activities aimed at young farmers. The irrigation network across the entire plot was also improved to optimise water use throughout the cultivated area. In December 2023, a further investment of over €400,000 was made, bringing the total investment in this Los Realejos agricultural land to over one million euros.
No post found!