There are 84 traditional salt mills (2021) producing industrial & edible salt in Cox’s Bazar zone according to ISMOS. They purchase crude salt then washing, crushing, iodizing, packaging the salt and marketing throughout the country.

Cox's Bazar district is the largest crude salt-producing and traditional salt mills zone in terms of volume as well as employment. According to the salt farmer census 2018, around 51,802.30 acres of land in Cox's Bazar district accounts for crude salt production by 22,563 salt farmers. In terms of production, around 95 percent of the 1.8 million MT crude salt produced per year in Bangladesh is produced in Cox's Bazar area.

The salt industry being one of the largest labors intensive cottage industries of Bangladesh absorbs largely around 5 million people directly or indirectly. The total value chain of the salt industry in Bangladesh involves largely two sub-sectorial activities namely-- the refining process which is operated by the salt mills and the crude salt production process that involves a significant amount of marginal farmers of coastal Bangladesh, specifically Cox's Bazar district.