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Green and fertile northern Tenerife contains some of the island's richest farmland and so has been one of the most densely populated areas of the island since pre-Spanish times. The region's terraces have played host to most of Tenerife's cash crop monocultures, including sugar cane, vineyards and today mostly bananas - though wine is still produced here and the local wine industry, centred on the Orotava valley , has recently undergone something of a renaissance. In the past, the fortunes of the locality have, however, fluctuated with the vines, which have been susceptible to mildew and the ravages of the vine weevil viteus vitifolii . As a result, the cultivation of bananas has been encouraged, and the economy of the valley has been increasingly dominated by its tourist infrastructure. Puerto de la Cruz is at the heart of this industry - the formerly modest port has become the island's major holiday resort outside the south coast. Adjoining it is the wealthy colonial town of La Orotava . And, despite its moody weather, treacherous seas and the steep slope of the land, other parts of the north coast have also been developed for tourism. Ugly, misbegotten, small-scale resort areas thrown up in the mid 1960s, as typified by Punta Del Hidalgo and Bajamar, are best avoided, though the occasional traditional fishing village has survived.
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