Cod fishing in Newfoundland waters began around 1500 (first the Bretons of France and then the Portuguese)

The life of the Portuguese fishermen is certainly idylized in this episode of land and sea, isn't it? .

That was 1967! The fishing got much worse until the northern cod fishery was finally suspended in July, 1992. When was the Grand Bank fishery suspended or heavy quotas imposed? This is, in fact, a very sad film.

By 1967, there were already Portuguese people living in Canada. During the 1950s, a large number of immigrants from the Azores and Madeira who were fleeing political conflict with the regime of António de Oliveira Salazar came to Canada by the masses. My parents were a part of that 50's wave.

@@roachy69 Yes, but did they end up in Toronto or in St John's. Newfoundland and Labrador is the poorest province in Canada and has more people moving out each year than are moving in. These fisherman came to fish each year and, then, went home for the off season. There are no women on these boats so they didn't come to Newfoundland and Labrador to settle, did they? Immigration Canada would have deported them if they'd tried to stay!

And no one of the portuguese fishermans speek english, but they eventually understand each other, the portuguese and canadian

Steve, the biggest irony is that today Portugal imports most codfish we eat! In fact, Portugal was already importing cod even when these men were fishing lots of cod! This fishing was part of a strategic campaign led by the Government of the time and as a result, more than half of the needs were covered. It all ended in the middle 70's, I think. I don't understand why they did not make an effort to get at least some of the fish out to the other ships as early in the movie it is said that there were other fleet ships in the neighborhood. Maybe there were more reasons than what is told in the movie, I mean for the sinking of the ship. The all thing was insane, I'm Portuguese but knew little about cod fishing during Salazar's Government and the more I read the more I get surprised. Since the 90's we were forbidden to fish in Newfoundland waters because fish was getting sparse. Today we have only 13 ships for this long distance fishing and we can't fish more than a certain quota that is easy fulfilled in the Barents Sea. We import codfish mostly from Norway.

@@belinhafernandes I was going to say the same. How about trying to move the fish to other ships and avoid all that waste? Besides, reducing the weight in the sinking ship could've actually saved it.

That is metal.