TUGUEGARAO CITY, Cagayan, Feb. 24 (PIA) — Aside from dried fish, ginger tea, garlic and onions, add bottled fish to your list of ‘pasalubong’ products from Batanes.

Locally called “Libang” among Ivatans or flying fish (Exocoetidae), the entire Rural Improvement Club members of the island has started to process them in bottles after the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR) provided them with a series of first processing and value-adding training for the said specie.

BFAR Director Jovita Ayson revealed that the flying fish is sold at only 35 pesos a kilo during its peak season usually during the months of March to April.

With the bottled product, it can now be sold at 60 pesos per 8 ounce bottles.

Earlier, BFAR provide 500 bottles to the RICs in Batanes to package the value-added product which can now be bought among island souvenir shops in all municipalities in the province. The bottled fish comes in tomato sauce, paksiw and Spanish style sardines.

Richie Rivera, fish processing expert of BFAR and the Provincial Fishery Action Officer of Batanes said that if and when the product will be patronized by tourists, it will form part of the livelihood projects of the rural Ivatan women.

The specie has been called a flying fish because the creature can have a speed of more than 70 kilometer per hour or 43 miles per hour with a maximum altitude of six meters above the surface of the sea.

Rivera said the proximity of Batanes to Taiwan, which is another flying fish area, will assure sustainability of the specie in the next few years.