China's salt price stable after ending state monopoly

BEIJING - China's table-salt price will remain stable and keep within a low price range due to large stockpiles and overcapacity, the top economic planner said Wednesday.

Zhao Chenxin, a spokesman for the National Development and Reform Commission, said that China could ensure the table-salt supply even in extreme scenarios, after salt system reforms.

Starting from 2017, China scraped table-salt price controls and ended a state monopoly on the production and sale of table salt, dismantling a 2,000-year-old system.

China's table salt reserve stood at 1.55 million tons by the end of 2016, according to Zhao.

China's reserves of rock salt hit 1.3 trillion tons, which would enable 26,000 years of continuous exploitation at the current annual output of 50 million tons.

China sold 10.5 million tons of table salt in 2015, far less than the annual capacity of 48 million tons.