Apenas 13 mulheres (only 13 women)
Portugal
Their bus leaves at 3:25 a.m. Thirteen women board the minibus, the youngest is 53, the oldest 66. They
are going to work, traveling from Vila Real de Santo António (VRSA) across the Guadiana River to Spain,
the last 13 Portuguese women from Portugal who still work in a canning factory, just like their mothers and
grandmothers and thousands of other women from the small town on the Guadiana River.
VRSA was once famous for its canned fish industry, and there was hardly a family that did not have a
connection to the factories. Fishermen who unloaded their catch from the Atlantic on the riverbank and
sold it directly to the factories. Men who headed and filleted tuna and sealed cans by hand. But it was
primarily women who were needed for the small fish, mostly sardines, which were prepared by hand for
canning. Removing the head and large bones in one movement, placing them in salt water and, after steam
cooking, in cans.
At that time, in the middle of the night or early in the morning when the fishermen had returned and the
catch had to be processed immediately, the women rushed to the factory. Some were barefoot, having
saved their only pair of shoes for work, while others came by bicycle. They would also come with their
babies, who were placed in a crib (often resembling a fruit crate) next to their workplace, or left at the
factory's daycare centre. They often began learning first work skills at an early age.
Canning factories were part of life in the region around VRSA, they were part of its identity. Until 2001,
when the last Portuguese factory closed its doors.
Vila Real de Santo António, was a factory town from the outset. In fact, in the 19th and 20th centuries, it
became the most important fishing port in the Algarve and one of the centers for canned fish in Europe.
The figures describe this economic success story, the boom in canned fish during the two world wars, and
the slow decline from the 1970s onwards. However, they tell us nothing about life behind the factory walls,
where it was mainly women who kept the machinery running.
Today, the factories are nothing more than ruins or have been replaced by apartment buildings overlooking
the river, and the fishermen have scrapped their boats in exchange for compensation payments from the
EU. 13 women remain. Carmina, Augusta, and Albertina met as young women in the Ramirez factory —
Augusta was just 14 years old. They were among the last workers in VRSA and the first to be recruited by
a Spanish factory owner twenty years ago. He had just built a new canning factory on the other side of the
Guadiana and was looking for experienced, reliable workers. All he had to do was drive across the bridge
to the other side.
At first, there were over forty women who traveled to Spain in the morning by bus, but now a minibus is
sufficient. Work begins at 5:30 a.m., which is an hour earlier for the Portuguese women due to the time
difference. They sit silently at the assembly line for eight hours, cleaning fish, interrupted by a half-hour
break and five minutes of collective stretching for shoulders and wrists. At 1:45 p.m., they get off the bus
again in Castro Marim, VRSA or Monte Gordo. At home, grandchildren, husbands, and exhaustion await
them.
Carmina, Augusta, and Albertina carry on. It is the work they know and, after all these years of colleagues
becoming friends, somehow also enjoy.
Vila Real de Santo Antonio (VRSA for short) is located in the far southeast of Portugal and has a history of over 100 years of fish canning factories, which are still visible in the small town.The main street in VRSA on the Rio Guadiana, along with the yellow house from the famous Ramirez factory owners.Albertina having coffee in the early hours of the morning in the only Tasca open next to the bus stop in VRSA.Maria Fatima, Maria José, and Encarnaçao in VRSA. The special bus is provided by USISA, the factory where the fish are preserved. The 13 Portuguese women are picked up in Monte Gordo,
VRSA, and Castro Marim.Conceiçaô (left) & Albertina in the early morning on the factory's special bus that picks up the women every day.At the same time, the fishing boats arrive at the port of Isla Cristina with their night‘s catch.Since the closure of almost all canning factories in Portugal, the number of fishing boats in the country has also declined to just a few. Many Spanish fishermen now hold permits to fish in Portuguese waters. This fish is also sold in Portugal, among other places.Maria José in the changing room before the start of her shift.USISA employs approximately 350 to 450 people, most of whom are women. Work begins at 6 a.m. and continues until 2 p.m., with a half-hour lunch break. Accompanied by Spanish music playing from loudspeakers, the fish are processed while the workers sit or sometimes stand.Conceiçaô at work.Portuguese women were and still are very welcome in Spain, because it was well known that; “Portuguese women are good with their hands” and therefore also faster.All the workers will be sent on a 10-minute break by their group supervisors.In addition to sardines and mackerel, the factory also produces canned tuna; the men are responsible for the preliminary processing of the fish that is, the more physically demanding tasks.At 11:00 a.m. on the dot, during a five-minute break, hands, arms, and necks will be stretched under the guidance of a supervisor.Albertina, Carmina, and Augusta at the Ria Guadiana in VRSA in front of the remaining walls of Comalpe, the last factory in Portugal where the women processed fish.The trip takes 50 minutes each way and crosses the Guadiana International Bridge, where the time changes by 1 hour at the other end.One of the printing plates in the Arquivo Histórico Municipal in VRSA for sardines, when the cans still had their labels printed directly onto the metal.The USISA factory store with its diverse range of fish products.One of the few monuments remembering the long and well-known history of canned fish production in Portugal, located in front of a fish processing company in Olhão.