The true worth of tilapia skin
13/09/2007
Thai entrepreneur Anchali Chatrakul Na Ayudyha has won high levels of interest after taking part at the BIFF and BIL event in Bangkok last month.
She has set up a fashion business called Angie and Penny’s that specialises in bikinis made from tanned tilapia skin. She says she is confident of winning orders for the bikinis from North America and Europe.
Ms Chatrakul told Reuters after the exhibition that her aim had been to take something that was worth nothing (or next to nothing) into something valuable.
Fish sellers in the port of Petchaburi, 120 km southwest of Bangkok, had been selling tilapia skins to street vendors for only a few cents per kilo. The street sellers would then fry them up to make a cheap snack.
Now the skins fetch up to $1.25 each and, after tanning and finishing, can go towards making the bikinis. It takes up to 15 skins to make a bikini, which Ms Chatrakul believes she can sell to discerning women clients for $75.
