The Hindu : Front Page : Rain brings salt industry to a standstill

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Apr 12, 2009
ePaper | Mobile/PDA Version

Front Page

Front Page

Rain brings salt industry to a standstill

Special Correspondent

— Photo: L. Balachandar

Suspended production: A view of a salt pan in Ramanathapuram.

RAMANATHAPURAM: The salt industry along the Ramanthapuram coast has virtually come to a standstill following torrential rain.

Coasts off Tuticorin, Ramanathapuram and Nagapattinam are considered as the core centres of salt production in the State. Some areas in Kanyakumari and Marakkanam in the northern coast also contribute to a smaller extent.

According to industry sources, salt production has totally been hit due to the unexpected summer rain for the past few days. Production is shelved in Ramanathapuram district, which contributes a major portion of the total salt production of the State.

It has resulted in temporary job loss to hundreds of workers.

The Tamil Nadu Salt Corporation, which has vast tracts of salt pans in Valinokkam near here, has also put on hold the production due to the heavy downpour.

“Salt production needs at least four to seven bright sunny days without any interruption. It is not so during April so far, particularly in the last one week. We hardly get sunshine. It has dealt a heavy blow on the producers,” says S. Venkata krishnan, a leading producer at Ramanathapuram.

He added that the summer season, which was supposed to have bright and sunny days in a year, was looking like a monsoon season.

Salt pans had to be restarted afresh.

Since the meteorological department has predicted more rainy days to come, it might take at least 2 weeks to restart the production to the usual level.

Mr. Krishnan said the unusual rain, besides causing huge production loss, had dealt a blow on the salt workers.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Front Page