NTB launches Bale Kita as a flagship hub for MSME products
The West Nusa Tenggara (NTB) provincial government has launched Bale Kita, a new centre dedicated to the promotion and marketing of local micro, small, and medium enterprise (MSME) products. Governor Lalu Muhamad Iqbal stated that Bale Kita is not merely a rebranding but a transformation towards more professional management with a concept that favours local business actors. The facility is designed to serve as a curation centre, a hub for product quality development, a place to enhance the capacity of entrepreneurs, and a means to expand market access for MSMEs from all regencies and cities across NTB.
Governor Iqbal emphasised that the main strength of Bale Kita lies in its commitment to presenting authentic products made by NTB artisans. He guaranteed that all marketed products are genuine handicrafts born from community creativity, with no factory-made goods allowed. This commitment to authenticity, maintained through a mandatory curation process to ensure quality, cultural identity, artistic value, and originality, distinguishes Bale Kita from other sales centres and positions it as an official showcase for NTB’s superior products.
Beyond a physical gallery, the provincial government is preparing a digital platform for Bale Kita to allow curated products to be marketed more widely, overcoming physical space limitations to reach national and international markets. The Governor also envisions the space evolving into an educational and cultural tourism destination, where each product is accompanied by a narrative detailing its origin, philosophy, raw materials, and production process, including works by prison inmates. Hj Sinta Agathia, Chairwoman of the NTB National Crafts Council (Dekranasda), explained that the name change from NTB Mall to Bale Kita, meaning ‘our house’, was intended to create an identity closer to local culture and serve as a shared home for all artisans. She added that product selection will be based on objective quality curation rather than personal connections, with a periodic product rotation system in place and a digital platform for items awaiting physical display. Dekranasda NTB will also strengthen the centre by facilitating intellectual property rights, halal certification, and national standards, and has secured support for partnerships with InJourney for airport product packages and with modern retail networks like Hypermart and UNIQLO.