RI looks to Japan, U.S. markets for giftware exports

JAKARTA (JP): Indonesia has a lot of room to increase its exports of wooden articles, ceramics and giftware to Japan and the United States, where demand for such goods is increasing steadily, trade officials said yesterday.

"Japan, with a population of about 125 million, is maintaining its tradition of gift-exchanging, which in turn boosts imports of gift items," the director of the Indonesian Trade Promotion Center for Osaka, I Made Raka Metra, told a three-day export forum here yesterday.

"There are so many seasonal, social and personal occasions where the Japanese always exchange gifts," Raka told the participants in the forum, which was opened on Tuesday.

He said the Japanese exchange gifts at new year, mid-year, father's day, mother's day, old-aged day, valentine's day and Christmas.

They also exchange gifts to mark personal events, like birthdays, weddings, ritual ceremonies for children at temples, births and deaths, he said.

He said that Japan's market for giftware amounted to 10 trillion yen (US$104 billion).

Imports of gift items increased by 14.7 percent to 370.7 billion yen in 1994, from 323.1 billion yen in 1993.

Japan's imports of giftware from Indonesia, its tenth largest foreign supplier, increased by 10.9 percent to 5.5 billion yen in 1994, from 4.9 billion yen in 1993.

Raka said that Indonesia has an opportunity to increase exports of 12 kinds of giftware to Japan: handbags, purses and wallets; bags and cases; tableware; kitchenware; interior statuettes; wooden articles; baskets; artificial plants; imitation jewelry; non-electrical toys; craft accessories; and textile interiors.

Meanwhile, the director of the Indonesian Trade Promotion Center in Los Angeles, Lili Soerojo Danusastro, said that Indonesia could also raise its exports of giftware and wooden and ceramic articles to the United States.

"U.S. annual spending on the purchase of ceramic tableware and kitchenware in 1989-1993 averaged more than US$1 billion," she said, adding that 90 percent of that spending was on imported items.

The director of the Indonesian Trade Promotion Center for New York, Bambang Miarsa, told the meeting that Indonesian exports of wooden frames rose from $86.8 million in 1989 to $163.6 million in 1994, indicating an average increase of 17.6 percent per annum.

He said that U.S. imports of wooden handicrafts had increased by 50 percent, from $300.3 million in 1989 to $467 million on 1994, while Indonesia's exports of such goods to the United States had increased from $10.6 million to $27.3 million.

Bambang is concerned that Indonesian businesses have failed to take part in the International Gift Fair in New York, the world's largest gift fair held twice annually.

Suprapti Wahyuni, a handicraft entrepreneur who owns gift workshops in Bali, Yogyakarta and West Java, told The Jakarta Post that overseas demand for gift items is increasing but that her company finds it difficult to meet the demand due to limited production capacity.(kod)