The recreational ruin / Fading fishing village / The labor camp / Inventive Societies
Continue
FADING FISHING VILLAGE
Able to cope?
The competition and rationalization in the fishing industries, a less fine-grained ownership structure together with the changes in fleet and fishing quotas affects the settlements. Some villages are losing in the competition for investments, boats and catch. Villages are fading and gradually falling apart as viable societies.
Place
Gryllefjord is located on the south side of the seven-kilometre-long Gryllefjorden, on a barrow shoreline. After the recent harbour investment, the harbour is well-spaced and well sheltered for the heavy weather outside the inlet. The 547m tall peak Middagstindenovershadows the village for six months. The place is organized along a harbour street and a parallel main-street following the terrain. Gryllefjord shows a dense and rather urban character, lacking the agricultural past that structured Torsken and Mefjordvær.
Gryllefjord, during the 20th century, could be named the major fishing village in Senja. The harbour was protected from the storms, there was access to building land close by the sea, the fishing grounds could be easily reached, and a set of industries worked well. Gryllefjord was home-port to a multitude of fishing vessels, and a seasonal harbour for boats during the winter fisheries. The settlement – typical for larger North Norwegian fishing villages – had to cope with the different historical situations in the fisheries, the professionalisation during the 19th century, the growth in the 1930s, the industrialization in the 1960s, and the decline in the fillet-freezing industries from the 1990s and onwards.
Local production1
Findings and annuals indicate that the years 1300–1600 were a rich fishing and trading period with seasonal fishermen working out of the harbour and traders, like the Hansa merchants, visiting. The fishermen and people living in the fishing villages in the 1500´s paid a considerably bigger amity of taxes than people in the peasant settlements. The dried fish had great value and through the Hansa-system grains and goods from northern Germany found their way to Senja
The European international trade system fell apart during the 17th century, fish prices dropped and grain was difficult to get, leading to a relocation of North Norwegian settlements towards where agricultural land could be found. Only a few inhabitants lived on in Gryllefjord. When the fisheries started to prosper with the industrialization in 1800s, fishing hamlets further out like "Holmen" and "Ørja" were the first choice. The shift in Gryllefjord came with a decision on 1894 by the industrialist Kaarbø from Harstad to use Gryllefjord as a base for his boats fishing on Svendsgrunnen. This led to that fishermen from more southern areas to choose Gryllefjord as their harbour.
The competition and rationalization in the fishing industries, a less fine-grained ownership structure together with the changes in fleet and fishing quotas affects the settlements. Some villages are losing in the competition for investments, boats and catch. Villages are fading and gradually falling apart as viable societies.
Place
Gryllefjord is located on the south side of the seven-kilometre-long Gryllefjorden, on a barrow shoreline. After the recent harbour investment, the harbour is well-spaced and well sheltered for the heavy weather outside the inlet. The 547m tall peak Middagstindenovershadows the village for six months. The place is organized along a harbour street and a parallel main-street following the terrain. Gryllefjord shows a dense and rather urban character, lacking the agricultural past that structured Torsken and Mefjordvær.
Gryllefjord, during the 20th century, could be named the major fishing village in Senja. The harbour was protected from the storms, there was access to building land close by the sea, the fishing grounds could be easily reached, and a set of industries worked well. Gryllefjord was home-port to a multitude of fishing vessels, and a seasonal harbour for boats during the winter fisheries. The settlement – typical for larger North Norwegian fishing villages – had to cope with the different historical situations in the fisheries, the professionalisation during the 19th century, the growth in the 1930s, the industrialization in the 1960s, and the decline in the fillet-freezing industries from the 1990s and onwards.
Local production1
Findings and annuals indicate that the years 1300–1600 were a rich fishing and trading period with seasonal fishermen working out of the harbour and traders, like the Hansa merchants, visiting. The fishermen and people living in the fishing villages in the 1500´s paid a considerably bigger amity of taxes than people in the peasant settlements. The dried fish had great value and through the Hansa-system grains and goods from northern Germany found their way to Senja
The European international trade system fell apart during the 17th century, fish prices dropped and grain was difficult to get, leading to a relocation of North Norwegian settlements towards where agricultural land could be found. Only a few inhabitants lived on in Gryllefjord. When the fisheries started to prosper with the industrialization in 1800s, fishing hamlets further out like "Holmen" and "Ørja" were the first choice. The shift in Gryllefjord came with a decision on 1894 by the industrialist Kaarbø from Harstad to use Gryllefjord as a base for his boats fishing on Svendsgrunnen. This led to that fishermen from more southern areas to choose Gryllefjord as their harbour.
In 1901, 16 stores were localized in Gryllefjord. 25 steamships were stationed in the harbour and 298 boats took part in the Senja fisheries. In 1904, a total of 54 “specialists” stayed in Gryllefjord, engaged in a variety of businesses, fishing production of course, but also the maintenance of steam machines, coal companies, bakers, a watchmaker, photographers etc. But these were mostly staying in Senja during the season, only four of them were registered as permanent residents.
The relative importance of the different Senja-villages varied over the years. Gryllefjord and Torsken gained importance in the 1920s and 1930s. The population in Gryllefjord increased from 367 in 1920 to 708 in 1950, and the village was the first in the southern part of Troms county to establish fillet industries and a harbour for the industrialized fisheries. Today the population is back to 380.
After the crises in the fillet-freezing industries in the 1990s, Gryllefjord has not been able to compete as a harbour for visiting boats during the winter season, the local boats have relatively speaking also lost in the competition for quotas and funding. The industries in Gryllefjord today is run by Nergård AS, one of the major actors in the Norwegian cod fisheries, Nergård also runs industries in the Senja fishing harbours Grunnfarnes and Senjahopen, and the production in Gryllefjord is limited.
Future
The cod fisheries are subject to major transformation forces. One of these are the system of fish-quotas, quotas that might be sold on the marked, leading to structural changes in ownership and fleet. Another is the tendency to concentrate ownership in the fishing industries on a few hands, the Nergård company and its industries on Senja being an example of this. A third tendency is international capital entering into the industries and a fourth are investments in digital production and robotization in the processing of the resources. Generally, these tendencies have brought about boats with larger capacity and a reduction of the number of active harbours. In Gryllefjord the short-term question is whether Nergård Senja will find it profitable to continue their varied landing and production of fish in this fishing village.
The cod fisheries are subject to major transformation forces. One of these are the system of fish-quotas, quotas that might be sold on the marked, leading to structural changes in ownership and fleet. Another is the tendency to concentrate ownership in the fishing industries on a few hands, the Nergård company and its industries on Senja being an example of this. A third tendency is international capital entering into the industries and a fourth are investments in digital production and robotization in the processing of the resources. Generally, these tendencies have brought about boats with larger capacity and a reduction of the number of active harbours. In Gryllefjord the short-term question is whether Nergård Senja will find it profitable to continue their varied landing and production of fish in this fishing village.
1Ottar Brox, «Folk og næringsliv» in Ivar Enoksen red. Ytterst i vest, Berg og Torsken Bygdebok, Bind 3. Finnsnes, Midt Troms Museum, 2011, 92–134.