South Sulawesi Local Products Poised to Enter 13 Countries via IGS B2B Forum

Local products from South Sulawesi have the opportunity to penetrate international markets, particularly in 13 countries participating in the Business to Business (B2B) Forum as part of the Indonesia Gastrodiplomacy Series (IGS) 2026 in Makassar. “IGS 2026 is a strategic event that brings together local business actors with potential trading partners from various countries. This provides a very large space for local entrepreneurs to expand their international market network,” said Haidir Halik, Chairman of the Indonesian Muslim Entrepreneurs Community (KPMI) of South Sulawesi, welcoming the forum’s implementation in Makassar on Wednesday. Through this forum, at least 13 countries showed interest in various leading products from South Sulawesi to explore investment opportunities and trade cooperation. The 13 countries involved in the business cooperation exploration are the Philippines, the Netherlands, Mexico, Venezuela, Ukraine, Ethiopia, Tunisia, Cuba, Laos, Fiji, Cambodia, Nigeria, and Costa Rica. According to him, the meeting took place in a business matching format between business actors needing commodity supplies and producers or exporters from South Sulawesi. “From what we observed, many transaction matches occurred. This is certainly good news for local entrepreneurs and the South Sulawesi government, which aims to expand export markets,” he said. According to Haidir, the greatest benefit of the B2B activity at IGS 2026 is the increased capacity and competitiveness of local entrepreneurs through direct access to the global market. Haidir assessed that the IGS 2026 B2B forum successfully created many transaction matches between local business actors and international buyers. “We can also learn to understand the needs of the international market while establishing sustainable business relationships,” he added. Regarding the products most in demand by prospective international trading partners, Haidir mentioned that South Sulawesi’s leading commodities remain the favourites. Number one is coffee, followed by chocolate and several other commodities. “It seems we need to start promoting passion fruit as a distinctive regional product with great potential. Its supply is not yet very large, but the quality is very good and it has promising market opportunities,” he explained. He added that many countries have long needed leading commodities from South Sulawesi but lacked direct access to local producers and exporters. Therefore, Haidir hopes the B2B forum, as part of IGS 2026, can continue to be held sustainably as a means of promotion and market expansion for the region’s leading products.