Odisha, which was once self-sufficient in salt production, is now importing 1.60 lakh metric tonne (MT) of salt from outside to meet its demand.
Despite having a 480-km-lonh coastline and Asia’s biggest salt lake Chilika, the State has witnessed a decline in salt production due to lack of necessary attention and encouragement towards the industry. Now, the State produces salt much less than its requirement of worth Rs 5 crore.
What is interesting is that there is no official project for salt production in the State so far. While there was only 1,324 acre land for salt production in the cooperative sector, approximately, 16,000 metric tonne salt was produced during 2005. The quantity has now reduced to 4,000 metric tonne.
According to official records, there is 3,813 acre land available for salt production. While annually 40,415 metric tonne salt was
produced during 2015, now it has declined to only 7,000 metric tonne.
In total, annual salt production was 56,258 metric tonne with a market value of approximately Rs 6 crore during 2005 in the State. Around 5,000 people were engaged in the field during the year. The quantity of salt production was reduced to 33,945 metric tonne during 2012 whose market value was only Rs 4 crore.
In 2014, only 10,000 metric tonne salt was produced in cooperative and private sectors in Odisha. The quantity further declined in the year 2015. Besides, the number of workers engaged in the salt production too has declined to around 1,200. Notably, the country produces around 2.70 crore metric tonne salt annually.
While Gujarat produces the highest 1.25 crore metric tonne salt, Rajasthan 21 lakh metric tonne, Tamil Nadu 25 lakh metric tonne and Andhra Pradesh 3 lakh metric tonne. Maharashtra produces over 1 lakh metric tonne salt annually.
While the country requires over 1 crore metric tonne salt for consumption annually, Odisha needs 1.75 lakh metric tonne.