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Because of the high purity of the raw salts, Qinghai Salt employs relatively simple production technologies such as open-pit mining technique. The lake water is highly concentrated in sodium chloride causing the huge amount of salt being naturally formed by crystallization on the water surface or at shallow water. Hence, high purity salt can be easily excavated from the salt lakes.

GSGL strives to improve the quality of salts and to reduce wastage through the utilization of more sophisticated extraction and processing machinery. There are also plans to improve efficiency at Qinghai Salt to reduce costs by streamlining the operations.

GSGL also emphasizes on research and development to widen the salt product offerings in order to cater to wider reach and different niche markets such as food seasoning, cosmetics, bath salts, etc. GSGL has close ties with renowned research institutes to develop products and processes for the GSGL Group. For instance, GSGL Group is sponsoring a research team at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in the PRC in their research on product development and manufacturing processes of salt and salt-based products from raw salt extracted from salt lakes.

The Qinghai Salt processing consists of three main steps, harvesting, washing and salt stacks.

Step 1: Harvesting
Our crews harvest the salt from the bed of the salt (1m to 2.5m) by mechanical harvester. The depth of harvesting depends on the quality of the salt in different locations. We work 24 hours a day, seven days a week to meet our annual production capacity. Our production operations begin in March and end in October every year depending weather conditions.

Step 2: Washing
The harvested salt is initially washed by saturated brine solution to wash off any clay or dust that may stuck on to the salt surface. Using the saturated brine as washing solution can minimize the salt dissolving during the process. After washing with saturated brine solution, the salt is then rinsed by pure water in order to remove the soluble ions, such as Mg2+, Ca2+, etc. After going through a series of washing process, the salt will reach as high as over 99 percent in purity.

Step 3: Salt Stacks
The cleaned salt is piled onto the stacker which helps to facilitate evaporation of water contained in the salt. The height of the salt stacks is about 13m. The salt will be stored in the salt stacks for about 6-7 months for evaporation of the water content.