British student develops fish waste 'plastic'

BRIGHTON, United Kingdom - A 23-year-old Briton has cooked up a compostable compound she hopes will one day replace much single-use plastic - and byproducts of the fishing industry are the main ingredient.

Lucy Hughes created Marina-Tex for her final-year project in product design at the University of Sussex. It's also edible and, she says, intended as an alternative to plastic typically used in bakery bags, sandwich packs and tissue boxes.

Her project began as an investigation into ways of reducing fish waste, around 50 millions metric tons of which are produced globally each year, the United Nations estimates.