Bitter harvest

Though salt makers in Mekong Delta have a bumper crop this year, the bottom has dropped out of the market. With sea salt fetching only 300 dong per kilo, a lot of salt-making households are in dire distress.

The price middlemen will pay for salt has fallen steadily from 2000 dong in March 2009 (see chart). It’s a problem of oversupply and foreign competition.

Six years ago, Tran Hoang De in seaside Dien Hai Commune (Bac Lieu province) sold his boat to pay bills and shifted to salt-making, a cottage industry for many poor people here.

De said that with more than 4000 square metres of salt pans, he could hope to support his family, if salt could sell for good prices. However, De could not imagine that the sale price would drop so dramatically.

“I got 40 tonnes of salt this crop. As the price has fallen to 300 dong per kilo, I could earn 12 million dong only. After paying expenses, I have no money left to feed three mouths in the year,” De complained.

Hundreds of salt households in Dien Hai Commune face similar difficulties. Huynh Van Chung says that he is leaving for HCM City to work there. “While waiting for the salt price to go back up, I have to take other jobs to feed myself,” he says.

It’s the same in many other coastal provinces. Tuoi Tre reporters who visited a salt field in An Ngai commune in Ba Ria-Vung Tau, saw only a few workers harvesting salt, while nearly a dozen others sat idle nearby. These people see no purpose in harvesting the salt, because there are no buyers.

Nguyen Van Gia said “it is now very sunny, excellent weather for making salt, but no one wants to work, because they know they will not be able to sell the salt.” The saltmakers have abandoned their fields,” he added.

Phan Thanh An added, sighing, “I have nearly hundred tonnes of salt unsold. I’ve left it in the field. The salt this year is not salty, but bitter”.

Prices drop because of… bumper crop

In a normal year, one hectare of salt field can produce 70-80 tons by the evaporation of sea water, but this year the sustained dry, sunny weather has enabled higher production – an average of 100 tons per hectare.

According to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, by April 18, Vietnamese saltmakers had harvested 514,000 tonnes of salt, 66 percent more than in the same period of 2009.

Tran Quang Phung, General Director of the Southern Salt Group, agrees that the increase in salt output has made the salt price drop. However, its not just Vietnam’s internal demand and supply that’s affecting the market. The domestic salt price has also been influenced by a more liberal import policy, he explains, that have brought 170,000 tonnes of imported salt onto the market.

“Only if the import quotas are revoked can the market be stabilized,” Phung said.

Tuoi tre

Tags: Vietnam salt, Vietnam salt imports