During the late 1970s and early 1980s, Canada's domestic offshore fleet grew as fishermen and fish processing companies rushed to take advantage. It was also during this time when it was noticed that the foreign fleets now pushed out to offshore and excluded from the rich Canadian waters, were increasing their harvest in the small areas of the Grand Banks that were outside the area of the EEZ. Canada's own fishery scientists assumed that only 5% of the Northern cod stocks was living in international waters regulated by NAFO. 95% of the cod stock was living inside the Canadian EEZ, where only Canadian vessels were allowed to fish. By the late 1980s, smaller catches of Northern Cod were being reported along the Atlantic coast of Canada as the federal government and citizens of coastal regions in the area began to face the reality that domestic and foreign overfishing had taken its toll. In the end, stocks of cod in and around Canada's EEZ were severely depleted. Reluctant to act at a time of declining political popularity, the federal government was finally forced to take drastic action in 1992 and a total moratorium was declared indefinitely for the Northern Cod. The TAC for both the Canadian EEZ and NAFO regulated area was based on Canadian scientific advice. This turned out to be wrong and the Northern cod stock collapsed in 1992, and has never recovered.