PT Sri Rejeki Isman Tbk (SRIL) alias Sritex held a release event for the export of textile products and textile products (ITPT) as many as 50 containers on Thursday (15/9). This product is dispatched to 20 export destination countries spread across four continents through the Port of Tanjung Emas, Semarang. The export value that departed on Thursday (15/9) reached US$ 3.7 million. The exported goods consist of several superior Indonesian ITPT products such as yarns, finished products and garments. The 20 export destinations in question are the United States, Argentina, Brazil, Dominican Republic, Egypt, Mexico, Turkey, Portugal, Poland, India, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Sweden, Bangladesh, Japan, South Korea, Spain, Malaysia, Thailand. , and Jordan.

The four countries with the largest total export value are Sweden with US$ 611,000, Egypt with US$ 475,000, Bangladesh with US$ 351,000, and Japan with US$ 268,000.

Sritex President Director Iwan Setiawan Lukminto said that ITPT contributed US$ 13.02 billion in foreign exchange in 2021. This made it one of the largest foreign exchange earners from the non-oil and gas sector and is a labor-intensive industry.

The sustainability of the textile industry also has a direct impact on 7.5 million workers and small and medium industry players (IKM). According to him, to continue to encourage the pace of national exports, support from the government is still needed in the form of policies that are right on target.

"We need to optimize import substitution, which is currently still burdening the textile industry and IKM and a Preferrential Trade Agreement (PTA) policy that protects the national ITPT industry," said Iwan in a press release, Thursday (15/9).

Together with the government, Sritex is optimistic that the ITPT industry will be able to overcome supply and demand imbalances as well as macroeconomic disruption. To achieve this, it is necessary to harmonize policies between ministries and local governments.

Currently, Sritex Group is engaged in five lines of integrated national textile industry ecosystem from upstream to downstream. The five lines are fiber, spinning, weaving, dyeing, and sewing or convection (garment). The five lines absorb a workforce of 50,000 employees.

Sritex Group has also fostered more than 2000 micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) as an effort to transfer knowledge to develop skills to improve the regional economy. The company provides raw material products that can be developed by the assisted SMEs and Vocational High Schools (SMK) so that there is added value in their products.

Until now, the composition of exports to Sritex's revenue still dominates at 60%. Sritex is committed to continuing to push the national textile export target to reach US$ 30 billion by 2025.