As a country that eats so much fish it is hardly surprising to find so much aquatic street art.
People in Portugal eat more fish than any other in mainland Europe, fifty-seven kilograms per head per year which is like eating your way through an average sized cod or tuna, Norway is second, Spain third and then France and Finland.
Beyond mainland Europe, Icelanders eat more fish than anyone else in the World at an average of ninety kilograms per person which is two average sized cod or tuna or a medium sized shark.
In the UK we like to think of ourselves as fish eaters and we voted to leave Europe on the basis of getting our fishing fleets back but we only eat cod or haddock or anything else from the same genus ( hake, colin, pollack etc.) and on average we eat a miserly fifteen kilograms per person per year.
Staying in mainland Europe, those who eat least fish are Albanians at only five kilograms followed by people from Serbia and North Macedonia and what is surprising is that none of these are really that far from the sea.
The most poplar fish in Portugal is Tuna ( I was surprised by that) followed by cod, sardines, squid and mackerel. The most popular fish in the UK is cod and in the USA it is prawns (shrimp), Canada and in Australia it is salmon; in France it is sea bass and in Spain hake. The most popular Christmas Day meal in Australia is prawns (shrimp) Throw another prawn on the Barbie Bruce.
All of these obscure facts are worth jotting down and remembering if you are in a pub quiz team.
To be fair a lot of Australia, Canada and the USA is a long way from the sea. Not surprising then that the United States accounts for 30% of the World consumption of canned Tuna.
At only one hundred and fifteen miles Miranda do Douro on the Spanish border is the Portuguese town furthest from the sea. In the USA Lebanon in Kansas (the geographical centre of the country) is six hundred miles from the Gulf of Mexico, in Canada Calgary is three hundred miles from the Pacific Ocean and in Australia Alice Springs is about five hundred miles from the Gulf of Carpentaria so I guess the supply of fresh fish from the coast can sometimes be a bit of a logistical problem.
Have Bag, Will Travel 