Up 33 Percent In 2021, Minister Of Industry Agus Gumiwang Is Optimistic That The Furniture Industry Can Be Great This Year

Illustration (Photo: Doc. Antara)

JAKARTA - Minister of Industry (Menperin) Agus Gumiwang Kartasasmita said that the opportunity for the national furniture industry to continue to fill the global market is wide open. According to him, this is shown by the solid performance of this sector over the past year.

"The export value of national furniture products has successfully penetrated 2.5 billion US dollars in 2021, an increase of 33 percent compared to the previous year which was 1.9 billion US dollars," he said in an official statement quoted on Friday, August 19.

The Minister of Industry added that another signal of growth came from the Center for Industrial Studies (CSIL), which estimates that global furniture consumption in 2022 will grow by 3.9 percent.

As for the domestic market, the policy of increasing the use of domestic products (P3DN) can also be a momentum for the furniture industry to improve performance and absorption of its products.

"For this reason, the domestic furniture and handicraft industry must pay special attention to obtaining Domestic Component Level (TKDN) certification so that they can sell their products in the government's e-catalog," he said.

However, the Minister of Industry does not deny that this sector is still facing various obstacles in its broad development, such as the COVID-19 pandemic which was followed by a geopolitical crisis that has caused prolonged shipping problems.

Then, another challenge that he expressed was the issue of market shock due to high inflation causing problems on the demand side.

"Obviously this makes logistics costs so high and even causes delivery failures," he said.

The third is related to the supply of raw materials in the form of large wood needed by business actors which is now decreasing and scarce. And the last is a matter of technology and human resource capabilities.

“These main issues have come to our attention, and the government will prepare various steps and support for efforts to solve these issues. This effort certainly requires us to coordinate and collaborate with other relevant ministries and institutions in accordance with their duties and authorities," he stressed.