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alt is found in almost everything you eat, but have you ever wondered how it s made? Long
ago, Taiwanese used to boil seawater until only the salt remained. Another method for
making salt was to use salt pans. These were shallow
2¿HOGV¿OOHGZLWKVHDZDWHU7KHZDWHULQ
WKH¿HOGVZRXOGJUDGXDOO\evaporate
3, leaving salt behind.
Taiwanese used salt pans to produce salt for hundreds of years. But in 2002, Taiwan s last
salt pan, called Cigu Salt Field, closed down
4. Salt pans fell out of favor for several reasons.
Traditional salt pans draw water directly from
5the ocean, but as Taiwan s industrialization
źbegan, water along the coasts became polluted
6, making the water unusable for salt production.
Factories, on the other hand, can use pipes to draw clean water from fartherRႇWKHFRDVW
Salt pans also don
t produce salt as reliably7as factories. The seawater in salt pans is exposed
to the weather for over 20 days. Any rain during this period will cause the evaporation
3process
to take even longer. A factory, by comparison
8, can produce salt in only eight to 10 hours!
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