Salt: a strategic resource for the blue economy and coastal communities – “Salt is one of the main ingredients found in our kitchens. It adds flavour to our food and is also used worldwide as a preservative, binder, and stabiliser.” — FAO
For coastal communities, however, salt has always been much more than a food ingredient. Produced from seawater through the simple interaction of sun, wind and human knowledge, it has shaped coastal landscapes, supported livelihoods and trade, and provided one of the oldest and most effective ways of preserving fish and transporting it far beyond the coast.
Today, this ancient activity is finding new relevance. From traditional salt pans and artisanal production to fish processing, tourism, mineral recovery, renewable energy and circular technologies, salt offers new opportunities to create value from the sea while supporting coastal communities.
From the Mediterranean to the African coast, salt is an old resource with a surprisingly modern role in the Blue Economy.
From the Mediterranean to Africa: a coastal economy built around salt
In Italy, the salt pans of Trapani in Sicily are among the clearest examples of how salt production can become part of the identity of a territory. Sea salt has been harvested there for centuries through a system of shallow evaporation ponds using seawater, sun and wind.
Today, the salt pans combine productive activity with wetland conservation, biodiversity, landscape, tourism and cultural heritage.
Across the Mediterranean, similar landscapes continue along the North African coast. Tunisia, for example, has an important salt sector, with several production areas distributed along its coastline and saline environments that have historically supported salt extraction.
Moving south along the Atlantic coast, salt remains closely connected to community livelihoods.
In Ghana, the relationship between salt and coastal livelihoods is particularly visible around the Songor Lagoon. Salt production has a long history in this coastal area and remains closely connected to the economy and identity of surrounding communities.
Further south, Angola has developed an established salt industry along its Atlantic coastline, with important production areas particularly in Benguela and Namibe.
Crossing the continent to the Indian Ocean, salt once again becomes part of the coastal landscape. In Kenya, an important salt-producing area extends north of Malindi, particularly around Gongoni, Marereni and Kurawa, where solar salt production has been established for decades.
Salted fish: an ancient technology with a modern role
One of the most important connections between salt and the Blue Economy is fish preservation.
Salting is among the oldest and simplest methods used to extend the shelf life of fish. By reducing the water available in fish tissue, salt helps create conditions that inhibit many microorganisms responsible for spoilage.
Combined with drying, the process becomes particularly valuable in tropical regions and remote coastal communities.
This matters because the fisheries value chain does not end when fish are landed.
Where refrigeration, ice production, cold storage or reliable electricity are limited or expensive, part of the catch can rapidly lose its commercial and nutritional value.
Salting and drying offer a relatively simple and low-cost way to stabilise fish, extend its shelf life and make seafood available to consumers far from the coast.
This creates several opportunities for small-scale fisheries: reducing post-harvest losses, extending the commercial life of catches, reaching inland markets, creating processed products and generating additional income within coastal communities.
But traditional does not mean that quality can be ignored.
Food-grade salt, good hygiene, correct salt concentration, appropriate drying, protection from insects and contamination, and suitable packaging are essential.
Improving these relatively simple steps can transform an informal preservation practice into a safer, more stable and higher-value local food product.
The saltworks of the future: from salt to minerals and energy
Innovation is changing the way we look at salt production. Salt may no longer be the only valuable product that can be obtained from seawater and concentrated brines.
The European SEArcularMINE project, coordinated by the University of Palermo and tested in Trapani, developed an innovative circular approach to recover magnesium, lithium, rubidium and other valuable elements from the residual brines generated by Mediterranean saltworks. The project also explored the possibility of recovering energy from salinity gradients, turning what was traditionally considered a residual stream into a new resource.
Discover the SEArcularMINE project at the University of Palermo
And this research is already moving forward. The MareMag LIFE project, running from 2024 to 2029, is building on SEArcularMINE’s results to demonstrate at operational scale a process for producing magnesium hydroxide from marine sources using renewable energy and without additional external chemical reagents.
Discover the MareMag LIFE project
Another emerging field is salinity-gradient or osmotic energy, sometimes referred to as blue energy. The principle is to exploit the energy released when waters or brines with different salt concentrations interact through specialised membrane systems. Companies such as SaltPower are working on technologies designed to convert this salinity gradient into electricity.
But innovation does not necessarily mean sophisticated or expensive technology.
In Senegal’s Lower Casamance, innovation has meant replacing fire with the sun.
Traditionally, women producing artisanal salt heated concentrated brine by burning mangrove wood. This required considerable quantities of fuel and placed additional pressure on mangrove forests. Artisanal solar salt production was subsequently introduced as an alternative, using sun and wind to evaporate the brine instead of burning wood.
The environmental difference can be significant. Research conducted in six villages found that traditional fire salt production required approximately three tonnes of wood for every tonne of salt produced. The transition to solar production in the pilot villages reduced pressure on forest resources, particularly mangroves, while also lowering production costs.
Read the study on solar salt production in Lower Casamance
These examples represent very different levels of innovation, but they share the same principle:
produce salt, use fewer natural resources, recover more value from brines and create new opportunities from what was previously considered waste.
For coastal communities, particularly in Africa, the most promising innovation may therefore come from combining traditional knowledge, appropriate technologies, renewable energy and circular economy principles.
The saltworks of the future could produce much more than salt.
Mossuril Salt Festival: where salt becomes culture
A particularly interesting example comes from Mossuril, Mozambique, where the 2nd edition of the Festival do Sal de Mossuril – Mossuril Salt Festival is scheduled for 27–28 November 2026.
Its slogan communicates in just a few words the broader message behind the Blue Economy:
“Onde o sal é cultura” — “Where salt is culture.”
And this is precisely the point.
Salt production is not only about extracting a commodity. In coastal communities it can represent work, knowledge, tradition, food, landscape and identity.
A festival dedicated to salt can therefore become a platform to promote local producers and products, preserve traditional knowledge, attract visitors, connect salt with local gastronomy and fisheries, and create new economic opportunities around an existing coastal resource.
From the centuries-old salt pans of Sicily to the salt-producing communities of Senegal, Ghana, Angola, Kenya and Mozambique, the same lesson emerges:
sometimes Blue Economy innovation does not mean discovering a new resource. It means creating more sustainable economic, social and cultural value from resources coastal communities have known how to use for centuries.
Salt: a strategic resource for the blue economy and coastal communities
