Step 1: To classify any public health action, ask where it sits on the disease timeline. If it stops disease from ever starting, it is primary; if it catches disease early, secondary; if it manages complications, tertiary.
Step 2: Iodizing salt simply tops up dietary iodine across the whole population so that goitre and other iodine deficiency disorders do not arise. Since it works in well people before disease onset, it belongs to the primary level, confirming option a.
Step 3: Primary prevention itself splits into health promotion and specific protection. Adding a specific nutrient through fortification is a textbook example of specific protection, sitting beside immunization and chemoprophylaxis.
Step 4: Compare this with screening a community for goitre, which would be secondary, or rehabilitating a child with cretinism, which would be tertiary. The salt fortification step is unmistakably primary prevention.
\[\boxed{\text{Primary prevention}}\]