Thank you Donald

"a mare labor - from the sea, work" Official motto for St. Pierre et Maquelon

Yes thank you, because the Donald's maniacal tariffs have alerted me to a tiny archipelago of eight islands off the coast of Newfoundland. So tiny that the label for the islands, has actually obscured them on this map. It's called St. Pierre and Miquelon, is French and has attracted the Donald's highest tariff - with Lesotho in Africa - of 50%! So many questions to answer, and it's been quite fascinating finding out the answers. Apologies to the around 6000 inhabitants for missing them on my world tour.

Since the Donald is in the title of this post, let me first deal with the reason for that ridiculously high tariff. And here I acknowledge an article from The Logic - 'Canada's Business and Tech Newsroom' - as it describes itself. Apologies for the lengthy quote below, but it's rather fascinating, and also very depressing.

"According to U.S. figures, most months—indeed, in some whole years—the value of all goods going back and forth between the U.S. and St-Pierre-Miquelon rounds down to zero. But 2024 was strange. Last July saw exports from the archipelago to the United States at a level unheard of in recent history: a US$3.4-million spike." ...

St-Pierre-Miquelon (whose population is about 5,100) exported those US$3.4 million of goods to the U.S. in 2024 … and imported only $100,000 worth. The dollar figures are small but the ratio is gigantic: a 3,300 per cent trade deficit, from Washington’s point of view. The U.S. government seems to have capped the trade-deficit part of its calculations at 99 per cent; Trump cut that number in half to arrive at his final tariff levels. ...

In June 2024, the French-flagged fishing boat Terre-Neuvas unloaded 16 tonnes of halibut at the docks in St-Pierre, according to news station FranceInfo’s reporting at the time. The fish were bound for sale in Boston. They’d been caught in international waters, two days’ sailing southeast of St-Pierre." The Logic

Well that sort of explains Donald - and even more frighteningly - his team of accountants as well. My thank you is because I had never heard of this place, and now I have learnt a whole lot about it, which I would never have done without Donald picking on it, because of one shipload of fish, actually just passing through St. Pierre. Would one shipload be worth US$3.4 million? If so - wow!

"Subject to fogs, good fishing ground all round" said Captain Cook as he sailed past. Which superficially is all you can say, but of course there is much more.

It's association with France, and specifically Brittany, Normandy and the Basque country, dates back to the 1400s when fishermen from those parts of the Atlantic and Channel coasts, would make summer expeditions to fish there. Now how brave is that? Mostly cod of course, but a whole lot more as well. In 1520 a Portuguese sailor João Álvares Faguades is credited with finding it, but did not claim it. Jacques Cartier did that a few years later in 1536 for the French, but there were no permananent settlers until the 1670s, just fishermen visiting in the summer season. Lots of shipwrecks - there are around 6or700 off the coast apparently.

For the next couple of hundred years the British and the French squabbled over it, depending on who was winning one of their wars back in Europe. In 1816 the British ceded it to France - well the French had lost everything else in the Americas by then, and Napoleon had just been defeated, so it was a 'noble' gesture. After that, at one point the islanders considered becoming part of Canada, and were offered various options by the French government although a 1958 referendum had 98% of the population saying they wanted to remain French. Today it is a Territorial Collectivity of France, since 1985. They vote in the French elections and have one Senator and one Deputy in the French government. The currency is the euro, although I think there are some limitations on their membership of the EU itself. The language is French - not Canadian French, but French French with a Breton/Normand/Basque influence and a large number of young locals finish their education in France with many of them not returning of course. There is very little immigration. No suprise there.

Fishing - for cod - has, of course been the main, really the only industry throughout its history, although they really made huge amounts of money in the 1920s when there was prohibition in America, by smuggling liquor into the USA. Al Capone himself stayed there for a time to manage it all, and apparently they made so much money they even lent money to the French. But of course prohibition ended, and the economy collapsed. Exacerbated even more by the embargo on fishing for cod. One figure I saw was that just 5.1% of the country's GDP is exports. Imports - mostly from Canada and France are huge, as there is very little farming land - forests were cut down centuries ago, the soil is thin and poor, and the climate somewhat hostile. Lots and lots of fog, and cold temperatures.

Today some cod is fished, as well as other fish and crustaceans, but the future rests with tourism, and there is also controversial talk of looking for oil. The controversy here is with Canada and France arguing over which bit of the sea belongs to who. An agreement was finally reached, but so far nothing ventured. In lots of ways you would have to wonder why France continues to support its existence.

As to tourism - well Newfoundland is very close, an hour or so's ferry ride away - that's it on the horizon in the photograph below left. The island - well double island, of Miquelon-Langlade - has just below 600 actual inhabitants, although it is much larger than St. Pierre so it's a wildlife and hiking treasure. There are seagulls, galore, seals, whales offshore and wild horses. The island of St. Pierre has the main town - main because it has the only deep water port - hotels, restaurants an airport and pretty streets of brightly coloured houses. A website called Sophie's World, explained the pretty colours thus:

"the fishermen coming home from long days at sea (possibly followed by a long stop at a bar), would recognise their homes."

Tourism for the more adventurous traveller perhaps.

But what about the food. Well it's fundamentally French which is not to be knocked of course. Here you will find all those French breads, pastries, cheeses, wine and classic French dishes using local fish and seafood. Most of the meat would be imported, although there seem to be a few farms - doing the artisan thing - goats and all that.

"The islanders retain a French appreciation of food at considerable cost to their government. Most meat and vegetables are imported from Canada, but other products, including cheese and wine, come in from Le Havre via Nova Scotia, with Paris subsidizing the freight. The French Air Force even delivers fresh lettuce or endive on its trans-Atlantic training flights." Cape Breton News

It took me a while to track down anything that was specifically St. Pierre-Miquelon until I found two rather different sources. The first was from reddit, where a local with the reddit nametag Miquelon, answered people's questions about the place. When it came to food he/she said this:

"Halibut with garlic is a local favourite. But cod tongues and cheeks are a local delicacy. Did I mention Lobster, every local has their own personal lobster trap. In fact we're France's highest lobster allergy per capita, cause, lobster." Miquelon/reddit

Finally, when I was about to give up, I found an article on the Saveur website from one Adam Leith Gollner, who visited the islands for the fish festival, and interacted with various locals who said a bit more:

“Our cuisine is French, with our own touches based on nature's offerings. ... tiaude, a thick fishermen's stew of potatoes, carrots, and cod; and boulettes de morue, salt cod fritters, known here as "cod snowballs." Denis Detcheverry/former mayor of Miquelon"

Somebody else also mentioned smelts - very small silvery fish, simply cooked over a fire with butter, and some potato fritters often with the addition of bacon and suchlike.

Previously and elsewhere, when looking for information on tourist sites, there seemed to be lots of pictures of scallops, cooked in a number of different ways, although gratinéed, as here, seemed to be the favourite.

As has become apparent over time I am a Francophile, so I find it mildly wondrous that a tiny begotten place such as this archipelago, thousands of miles away from France, and yet so close to the USA and Canada and their very different attitudes to everything under the sun, can remain so very French. Their children go to France to be educated - not to Canada or the USA. Well I'm sure some do, but the majority go to France. Maybe it's because they have kept the French language. Maybe it's because the population is overwhelmingly descended from those original fishermen of the 1400s from Brittany, Normandy and the Basque country. So French that France should hang on to this outpost. A bit like the Falklands in a way - another of the Donald's targets, and as awful as that tariff is, I'm guessing it won't affect them very much.

So thank you Donald. I learnt a lot today.

YEARS GONE BY

April 7

2024 - Fermented herrings to taco Fridays - Sweden - now there's an almost coincidence

2023 - Nothing

2022 - English ingredients - a maligned cuisine

2021 - On fish stews - a lucky dip

2020 - Deleted

2019 - Nothing

2018 - Icelandic or Greek? Yoghurt or cheese?

2017 - Central SW France - our holiday destination