Bohol's Asin Tibuok Among Intangible Cultural Heritage to Safeguard, Says UNESCO
Behind the traditional Boholano salt is a labor-intensive process we ought to protect.
Published on Dec 10, 2025
(SPOT.ph) Asin tibuok has been making bigger waves in the local food community the past couple of years—rightfully so for its complex taste and the fascinating, centuries-old process of making it. Most recently, the artisanal sea salt from Bohol has been included in the UNESCO’s List of Intangible Cultural Heritage in Need of Urgent Safeguarding.
Also read:
No, Nas Daily, Filipinos Don’t Eat Dino Eggs—Asin Tibuok Is an Artisanal Salt
UNESCO adds asin tibuok to list of cultural heritage to safeguard
UNESCO’s List of Intangible Cultural Heritage in Need of Urgent Safeguarding highlights living practices—that includes traditions, skills, rituals, music, crafts, and social customs passed on through generations—at serious risk of disappearance. They recently added a number of entries from around the world, the Philippines’ own asin tibuok being one of them.
Described to resemble a “white egg inside a brown shell,” asin tibuok is a traditional sea salt from Bohol made by hand, with natural materials and traditional techniques that have spanned generations. Salt makers gather coconut husks and soak these in seawater for months before they’re dried, burned, and mixed with seawater to form a brine that’s boiled down in clay pots to produce the salt. The process is often a family activity, UNESCO writes, with men usually taking on the salt-making (a "physically demanding" activity); women cooking, cleaning, and making the pots; and children watching and helping their parents out—in effect learning how to make it firsthand. More than being a versatile product in the kitchen (it's got a subtly smoky note we dig), asin tibuok is a “key part of daily life and food traditions” that supports Boholano livelihoods and plays a star role in gatherings.
Asin tibuok joins the likes of Vietnam’s Đông Hồ folk woodblock printing, Pakistan’s Boreendo clay musical instrument, and Uzbekistan’s Kobyz string instruments on the UNESCO list.
Just last October, the Intellectual Property Office of the Philippines also registered asin tibuok to hold the Geographical Indication (GI) label, designed to recognize products originating from a specific territory, region, or locality, where some characteristic of the good is “essentially attributable to its geographical origin and/or human factors.” It’s also on the Slow Food Organization's Ark of Taste, which lists endangered heritage foods from around the globe.
For Trish, food is as much a source of pleasure and fuel as it is an outlet for creativity; a medium by which stories can be passed on; and a way to connect with others.