72 Thousand Chinese Textile Containers Enter The Republic Of Indonesia, DPR Sentil Customs To The Ministry Of Trade

Photo by CHUTERSNAP on Unsplash

JAKARTA - Deputy Speaker of the Indonesian House of Representatives Cucun Ahmad Syamsurijal highlighted the flood of illegal imported textile goods from China entering Indonesia. He considered this to be one of the causes of the destruction of the domestic textile and textile (TPT) industry and asked the Government to immediately take firm steps.

"If our market is controlled by foreigners or imported products from abroad, it means that there is indeed a wrong system. Imagine, 72 thousand illegal containers. This is a lot. No wonder our textile industry is battered," said Cucun, Friday, November 29.

According to the Indonesian Filament Filament Rate and Benang Producers Association (APSyFI) citing data from ITC and TradeMap, in the last 5 years, there were 72,250 illegal TPT imported containers from China that entered Indonesia. State losses reached around Rp 46 trillion.

From the same data, it is also stated that the export value of TPT China to Indonesia throughout 2019-2023 has a gap of up to billions of US dollars compared to TPT Indonesia's import data from China. The data is for TPT number HS 50-63.

In addition, the successive export value of TPT China to Indonesia in 2019-2023 was US$5.09 billion, US$3.79 billion, US$5.86 billion, US$6.50 billion, and US$5.28 billion. There is a consecutive gap of US$1.12 billion, US$706.1 million, US$1.79 billion, US$2.12 billion, and US$1.47 billion from the import value of TPT Indonesia from China.

Seeing the data, Cucun questioned the Government's presence so far.

"Why can we get missed like this. Where is missed and the gap. This condition threatens the welfare of the people," he said.

"We also have to question how to supervise Customs and Excise. The taring is sharp to our own people, but the imported goods are flooded, why just let it go," added Cucun.

Not only Customs and Excise, Cucun also highlighted the performance of the Ministry of Trade (Kemendag) which is also like neglecting this issue.

The Ministry of Trade, including law enforcement officials and other relevant agencies, also seemed to close their eyes. This should be a hard slap for the government," said the electoral district legislator from West Java II.

Cucun reminded that there will be many derivative impacts due to the flood of imports of illegal textiles.

"It is inevitable that the weakening TPT industry will cause massive layoffs. The textile industry is small, medium to large textiles will decline," explained Cucun.

As is known, the textile industry in Indonesia has been slumped in recent years. In the aftermath of a mass layoff storm in the TPT and garment industries.

In early July 2024 alone, at least 11,000 workers in this industry experienced layoffs. There are also textile factories that perform employee efficiency. Several factories are still running, but cut their employees in early 2024. Not to mention the emergence of the bankruptcy case of PT Sri Rejeki Isman Tbk or Sritex, which is a textile giant.

Based on data from the Ministry of Manpower, nearly 60 thousand people have been laid off from early 2024 to last October. For this industry, 59,796 people have been laid off from January to October 2024.

The province with the most layoffs, namely in DKI Jakarta, reached 14,501 people, of which the figure rose 94% compared to September 2024. Meanwhile, the laid-off workforce in Central Java decreased 23.8% on a monthly basis to 11,252 people. And the third rank, the province that experienced layoffs was Banten with an increase of 15.47% on a monthly basis to 10,524 people.

Cucun is also worried that more and more textile industries will go out of business if there is no improvement in supervision and law enforcement from illegal textile import practices.

"If the industry goes out of business, this will increase the unemployment rate in Indonesia because many will be laid off," he said.

"We urge the Government to take quick steps to overcome the entry of illegal imported goods that have caused the domestic industry to be sluggish. We should not be careless," added Cucun.

On the other hand, the leadership of the people's welfare coordinator sector also encouraged the Government to immediately revise Permendag Number 8/2024 which is considered to be one of the factors in the domestic market being flooded with imported products at low prices, thus eroded national business actors. Because if imported goods are not limited, Cucun said the portion of imported goods will be higher along with the transfer of almost all retail players to online.

"The purchasing power of the people has decreased so that there is no economic turnover. This is very dangerous and can hinder the government's target of wanting to achieve economic growth by 8 percent," he said.