Why sacrificial hides need care: salt, prices and Bangladesh's leather trade

On the night of 25 May 2026, three days before Eid-ul-Azha, Jagonews24 published an opinion column on the hides of sacrificial animals by Ahsan Habib Barun, a journalist, columnist and editor of the newspaper Amar Din. His central point was that every year a large share of the hides from the Eid sacrifice rots or loses quality because they are not flayed with care and salted in time, and that the loss falls on the families who offer the sacrifice, on seasonal traders, on madrasas and orphanages, and on the country's leather industry.

The National Moon Sighting Committee had announced on 18 May that the Zilhaj moon had been sighted and that Eid-ul-Azha would be celebrated in Bangladesh on Thursday, 28 May. By the time the column appeared, the government had fixed the prices of rawhides, decided to hand out salt free of charge to preserve them, and begun training meat processors and hide preservers. This report sets out the columnist's argument together with the government decisions of those weeks, the figures on animals and hides, the established guidance on preserving hides and the background of the leather industry.

Barun wrote that millions of animals are slaughtered in Bangladesh at Eid-ul-Azha and that the rawhide they yield is one of the main raw materials of the leather industry. In his view, a lack of awareness, poor preservation, transport difficulties and weak market management mean that a large part of it is wasted each year. He urged readers to see the hide not as a mere by-product but as a national resource.

The biggest problem, he observed, starts right after slaughter. Too little salt, leaving hides in damp places, drying them too hard in the sun or leaving them neglected for long all reduce their quality. He called the government's decision to distribute free salt timely, and advised people to clean the hide and salt it immediately after slaughter, store it so that air can move around it, and get it quickly to a collection point or warehouse.

The column also turned to the market. The writer alleged that although the government sets hide prices every year, those prices are often not applied on the ground, that traders cut prices on various pretexts, and that middlemen and an influential group control the trade. As remedies he proposed strict monitoring, digital tracking and a transparent auction system. These allegations are the columnist's own view; the column names no trader or company.

Barun argued further that local administrations, city corporations, mosque committees, voluntary groups and the media could run campaigns before Eid to teach people how to preserve hides. On the environment he stressed effluent treatment at tanneries and cleaner technology, and on the economy he called for making more high-value leather goods at home rather than relying on raw leather. On the religious side, he wrote that Islam discourages waste and that using every part of the sacrifice properly is a duty.

On 13 May 2026, after a meeting at the Secretariat of the committee for the proper management of qurbani-related matters, Commerce Minister Khandaker Abdul Muktadir announced the new prices. Salted cowhide was set at Tk 62 to Tk 67 per square foot in Dhaka and Tk 57 to Tk 62 outside the capital. Across the country, salted castrated-goat (khasi) skin was set at Tk 25 to Tk 30 per square foot and female-goat (bakri) skin at Tk 22 to Tk 25.

At the same briefing the minister said the government would deliver salt free of charge across the country so that no hide was wasted, and that salt worth Tk 17.6 crore had already been bought. It was to reach districts and upazilas through the Bangladesh Small and Cottage Industries Corporation (BSCIC). He added that each district and upazila administration would call in representatives of mosques and madrasas and train them to preserve hides after the sacrifice. According to the daily Ittefaq, the minister put the cost of the training and the salt supply at about Tk 20 crore, and law enforcement agencies were told to stay alert to stop hides being smuggled out.

Earlier, on 4 May, after a session of the deputy commissioners' conference, the same minister had said that salt supply, training and publicity would be organised by the government and that the movement of hides would be controlled for a set period after Eid. On 7 May the state news agency BSS reported Home Minister Salahuddin Ahmed as saying that at village and upazila level hides must be kept in salt for up to seven days, and that no hide could be brought into Dhaka during that time. His reasoning was that this would ease the load on Dhaka's effluent treatment system and prevent hides from spoiling. bdnews24 had reported before the 2024 Eid that, as in the past, hides from outside the capital would not be allowed into Dhaka for seven days after Eid.

On 19 May BSS, citing the task force set up to recommend measures for the leather sector, reported that Bangladesh Bank had issued a circular on 5 May. Under it, hide traders with rescheduled or defaulted loans could still take new working-capital loans until 30 June, and banks were told to set this year's lending target for the leather sector no lower than in 2025. The task force had also drawn up a draft database of hide warehouse owners and traders across the country, with a plan to bring them under registration, and arranged training for meat workers and mosque imams.

At a briefing at the Ministry of Fisheries and Livestock on 3 May 2026, Minister Mohammad Amin Ur Rashid gave the expected demand for sacrificial animals as 1,01,06,334 against an availability of 1,23,33,840, leaving a surplus of about 22,27,506. The animals available comprised 56,95,878 cattle and buffaloes, 66,32,307 goats and sheep and 5,655 animals of other species. He said more than 3,600 cattle markets would be held across the country, 27 of them in Dhaka's two city corporations, and that professional and non-professional butchers and workers were being trained so that hides would not be wasted.

District figures told the same story. Chapainawabganj is one example: citing the district livestock office, BSS reported on 12 May that 2,26,050 animals were ready for sacrifice in the district's five upazilas against a demand of 1,67,202. Among them were 84,801 goats and 12,922 sheep, a reminder that small-animal skins also arrive in large numbers in this season.

The numbers were close to those of earlier years. Prothom Alo, citing the Department of Livestock Services, reported that in 2024 demand was 1.07 crore animals with about 1.30 crore ready, and in 2025 demand was about 1.038 crore with about 1.2447 crore ready. The same 2025 report said tannery owners aimed to collect 80 to 85 lakh pieces of hide that year, and that 50 to 60 percent of all the hides collected in a year come in during the sacrifice season.

The prices the government announces each year are for salted hides, per square foot. According to a 2024 Prothom Alo report, salted cowhide was priced at Tk 50 to Tk 55 per square foot in Dhaka and Tk 45 to Tk 48 outside it in 2023. In 2024 these rose to Tk 55 to Tk 60 in Dhaka and Tk 50 to Tk 55 outside, with khasi skin at Tk 20 to Tk 25 and bakri skin at Tk 18 to Tk 20. In 2025 the Dhaka price was Tk 60 to Tk 65 and the outside price Tk 55 to Tk 60. For 2026 cowhide went up by Tk 2 per square foot both in and outside Dhaka, and khasi skin by Tk 3.

Most hides that change hands right after the sacrifice, however, are raw and unsalted. Prothom Alo wrote in 2025 that the government sets no price for these; buyer and seller settle it by bargaining. Typically people from madrasas and orphanages or seasonal traders gather raw hides and take them to temporary markets, where tanneries, warehouse owners and dealers buy them at estimated prices, salt them, and later sell the salted hides to tanneries at the government rate.

Warehouse owners at Posta in Dhaka told Prothom Alo that salting each hide, including transport and labour, costs them Tk 290 to Tk 320, and that they buy raw hides at Eid with this cost in mind. The same report said coarse salt is normally used; in 2025 a 74 kg sack of coarse salt cost Tk 1,050, down from Tk 1,350 the year before. Someone who can salt a hide and keep it for a few days therefore has more room to bargain.

A technical note from the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), 'Salting of hides and skins', based on the work of its hides and skins consultant T. J. Devassy, explains that a freshly flayed hide holds about 65 to 70 percent water. At that moisture bacteria and other micro-organisms multiply quickly and the hide putrefies. Salt draws water out of the hide and creates conditions in which micro-organisms cannot grow. Wet salting brings the moisture down to about 40 to 45 percent, and dry salting to about 12 to 15 percent.

The UNIDO note adds that one drawback of sea salt is 'red heat', reddish patches on the flesh side caused by salt-tolerant bacteria. Salt that is too fine runs off as brine before the hide can absorb enough of it; the note suggests a grain size of 2 to 3 millimetres. It also advises against sweeping up used salt and applying it again, because salt contaminated with blood, dung and dirt can carry harmful bacteria.

There is older research on why Bangladeshi hides lose value. A survey by A. S. Dey, M. Nooruddin and M. F. Mian, published in the Bangladesh Journal of Training and Development in 1992, visited 63 slaughter places and 108 hide curing and storage establishments in 14 districts. At the slaughter stage it found faults such as badly designed, sharp-pointed flaying knives, careless and rapid flaying, inexperienced flayers particularly during Eid-ul-Azha, and artificial over-stretching of goat skins. At the preservation stage it found delays in curing, particularly during Eid-ul-Azha, and in rural areas under-salting, dry salting and drying hides on the ground.

The Bangladesh Tanners Association (BTA), the body of tannery owners, gave one measure of how large the loss can be. Prothom Alo's 2025 report quoted the BTA as saying that in the first two days of Eid in 2024 about 5 lakh raw hides were spoiled across the country for lack of preservation, most of them goat skins.

Ahead of Eid-ul-Azha in 2018, the Department of Agricultural Marketing issued a statement on how to flay and preserve the hides of sacrificial animals, which Jagonews24 published on 18 August that year. The main points of the department's list were:

• Let the animal rest and give it enough water before slaughter; it is better not to feed it for 12 hours beforehand.
• Clean the place of slaughter well, use a sharp knife and dig a suitable pit for the blood; afterwards fill the pit with earth.
• Allow enough time after slaughter for all the blood to drain.
• While flaying, make sure no meat or fat stays on the hide, that it is not cut anywhere and that no dirt gets on it.
• Salt the hide within 4 to 5 hours of flaying; once slaughter and butchering are over, clear all waste and bury it.
• Spread the hide taut with the flesh side up and sprinkle enough salt on it to draw out the water; repeat if needed before the hide is sold.

The UNIDO note describes wet salting in more detail. The hide is laid on a wooden pallet and salt is spread evenly over the flesh side, at 35 to 40 percent of the green weight for cattle hides and about 50 percent for goat and sheep skins. Further hides are laid on top and salted in the same way, so that the brine drawn out by the salt drains away with blood and other soluble matter. The pile is left for about five days, then rebuilt with the top hides at the bottom and more salt added if needed. The pallets should stand about six inches off the ground so that the brine drains and air reaches the bottom of the pile, which prevents heating and rot.

For people who handle only a few hides, such as butchers and farmers, the note describes a simpler 'quick dry salting': after salting, fold the hide with the flesh side in and all four sides brought inwards, leave it for two days, then open it, let it drain and dry first the flesh side and then the hair side. Salted hides, the note says, should be stored in a ventilated room protected from rain and sun.

Raw-hide traders at Posta gave a household-level guide to how much salt is needed. Quoted in Prothom Alo in 2024 and 2025, they said a large hide of 35 to 50 square feet needs 8 to 9 kg of salt, one of 55 to 60 square feet about 10 kg, a medium hide of 20 to 25 square feet 5 to 6 kg and a small one of 15 to 16 square feet 3 to 4 kg. One kilogram of salt is enough for more than two goat or sheep skins. The traders advised salting in shade, under a tree, in a garage or under a pandal, since neither rain nor strong heat is good for a hide. For anyone unable to salt a hide themselves, their advice was to sell it raw to a nearby warehouse as quickly as possible.

In Bangladesh a large share of sacrificial hides is donated to madrasas, orphanages and lillah boardings, which earn part of their income by selling them. On 21 May the Department of Livestock Services held a 'Qurbani Training Workshop 2026' at the Krishibid Institution Bangladesh for meat processors, hide preservers and veterinary medical teams. There Minister Mohammad Amin Ur Rashid said that sacrificial hides are mostly donated to madrasas, and that proper removal of fat, salting and preservation would raise their quality. Without trained people for delicate work such as flaying, he said, the quality and market value of hides fall, and he proposed training madrasa students and young people around them to build a skilled workforce for the sacrifice season.

BSS, citing the task force, also gave figures for the previous year's salt distribution. In 2025 the plan was to buy 11,571 tonnes of salt with a Tk 20 crore allocation for 9,330 madrasas, orphanages and lillah boardings; in line with actual district demand, 8,096 tonnes were finally distributed, which made it possible to preserve about 13,79,923 hides. The task force's preliminary estimate was that 80,000 to 85,000 tonnes of salt might be needed to preserve hides in 2026, against about 70,000 tonnes used for the purpose in 2025. It said enough salt would be made available at district, upazila and union level, at cattle markets and in local shops, and that lists of salt dealers and mill owners would be provided.

Before the 2024 Eid, reporting on the seventh meeting of the leather-sector task force at the Ministry of Industries, bdnews24 wrote that BSCIC would oversee the free supply of salt to orphanages and that deputy commissioners would be sent semi-official letters asking them to build temporary storage at strategic places for collecting hides locally and preserving them with enough salt. The free salt of 2026 was thus the continuation of an arrangement from earlier years, with its scale and funding set afresh.

According to Banglapedia's entry on tanneries, the first tannery in what is now Bangladesh was set up at Narayanganj by R. P. Saha in the 1940s. It was later moved to Hazaribagh in Dhaka, which grew into a cluster of tanneries. After independence, about 30 tanneries abandoned by their owners came under state management, and in 1982 they were handed to private entrepreneurs. To encourage more value addition, the government banned the export of wet-blue leather in 1991, after which the country began making and exporting crust, finished and split leather.

The same entry, citing figures for 2020, says there were about 220 tanneries of various sizes in the country, 190 of them packed into just 60 acres of Hazaribagh. According to the entry, the tanneries were relocated in 2016 to a new 200-acre estate at Hemayetpur in Savar with a central effluent treatment plant (CETP), and 155 had moved there by the time it was written. Citing the BTA, Banglapedia says about 25,000 workers and 150 technologists work in the tanneries, and about 1,500 business people are engaged in collecting raw hides and skins and bringing them to the wholesale centre at Posta in Dhaka. The country produces roughly 200 to 220 million square feet of raw hides and skins a year, about 85 percent of which is exported as crust, finished and split leather. By Banglapedia's account, export earnings from leather and leather goods reached US$519.91 million in 2017-18.

A picture of the environmental problem while the tanneries were in Hazaribagh comes from a Human Rights Watch report of October 2012. Citing government estimates, it said about 21,000 cubic metres of untreated effluent was released in Hazaribagh every day, ending up in Dhaka's main river. The report said Hazaribagh then held an estimated 90 percent of the country's tanneries, employing up to 15,000 workers. Human Rights Watch also noted that the High Court had ordered the tanneries to be moved out of Dhaka in 2009, and Banglapedia's entry on the leather industry likewise refers to plans for relocation to address the environmental concerns caused by so many units concentrated in a small part of old Dhaka.

The capacity of the Savar estate is tied directly to how hides are handled in the sacrifice season. The Home Minister's seven-day rule against bringing hides into Dhaka was justified as a way to ease the load on effluent treatment. On 19 May BSS, citing the task force, reported moves to ensure an uninterrupted supply of electricity at the proper voltage to the BSCIC Leather Industrial Estate in Dhaka for three months after Eid, with a recommendation that PBS-3, the Rural Electrification Board and Power Grid Bangladesh be instructed accordingly. The task force also stressed round-the-clock power to the CETP through a dedicated express feeder line, emergency control rooms at the estate and the CETP, and a special load allocation from the Savar grid.

Photo: Salil Kumar Mukherjee / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Sources: Jagonews24 (column by Ahsan Habib Barun), BSS, The Business Standard Bangla, Desh Rupantor, The Daily Ittefaq, Dhaka Tribune, Prothom Alo, bdnews24, United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), Bangladesh Journal of Training and Development (via FAO AGRIS), Banglapedia, Human Rights Watch