ENGLISH DEYEA NEWS

By LAWI WENG / SANGKHLABURI: Amid worries that Burma’s food security could be at risk if farmers in the cyclone-ravaged Irrawaddy delta don’t start planting rice soon, there are growing concerns that the country is also facing a shortage of another dietary staple: salt.

Merchants at the Bayintnaung wholesale market in Rangoon said that traders have been turning to Mon and Arakan states to meet the demand for salt since the Irrawaddy delta, the center of Burma’s salt industry, was hit by Cyclone Nargis last month.

“Normally seventy percent of salt consumed in Rangoon comes from the delta,” a salt trader told The Irrawaddy. “Now we are worrying that a shortage will come very soon.”

Meanwhile, the price of salt has hit an all-time high.

A trader in Mudon, a town in Mon State, reported that salt now costs 600 kyat (US $0.50) per viss (a standard measurement of about 1.63 kilograms), or six times the usual price.

“Even if you have money to buy salt, it is no longer available for purchase in Panga,” he added, referring to a village in Thanbyuzayat Township that is the main salt-producing center in Mon State.

A Panga villager who recently arrived on the Thai-Burma border told The Irrawaddy: “Each day about ten trucks transport salt from our village to Rangoon.”

As other areas struggle to make up for lost salt production in the Irrawaddy delta, residents of Burma’s southernmost regions, including Mon State, say they are now facing a salt shortage themselves.

This is a development that especially worries local fishermen, who say that unless they have an adequate supply of salt to cure their fish, they will be forced to watch them rot.

Although the United Nations recently distributed salt in the areas worst affected by the cyclone, many fear that the local salt industry will not be able to make up for the lost production due to the onset of the rainy season.

Burma’s coastal areas are major sources salt for the whole country. The Irrawaddy delta typically provides about half of the salt consumed in Burma, while Rangoon Division and Mon State supply about 25 percent. The remaining 25 percent comes from Arakan State.

Rangoon correspondent Kyi Wai contributed to this report.