The textile industry in Indonesia will still face pressure due to the invasion of illegal imports and weakening global demand. Evidently, Indonesia's cotton imports are predicted to remain unchanged this year, namely around 2 million bales. Assuming the thread industry will still use up existing inventory or stock before buying a new one. Imports in 2022 are predicted to drop to 2 million bales from the previous 2.57 million bales in 2021. "Sluggish global demand and intense competition with imports in the domestic market has resulted in lower cotton consumption," said the April 2023 issue of the USDA FAS (agricultural information service) April 2023 report.

"Thus, the end of 2022 stock will increase to 547,000 bales. The end of 2023 stock is expected to decrease to 539,000 bales," as quoted Wednesday (3/5/2023).

The decline in stocks is because the industry will still use existing stocks and is anticipating the utilization of 2 million bales this year.

USDA analysis said that there was a combination of the weakening of the rupiah, limited consumer purchasing power. Plus, the increasingly tight competition with illegally imported clothing and textile products. Also, the weakening of demand in export destination countries due to the global economic slowdown.

This condition causes Indonesia's cotton consumption to be predicted to be in a pessimistic trend. This is a continuation of the condition of the final semester of 2022.

The report stated that cotton consumption in 2022 is predicted to fall by 26.9% to 1.9 million bales compared to 2021 which reached 2.6 million bales.

He added, assuming there is an improvement in domestic conditions, where currently there are efforts to suppress illegal imports and imports of cheap textile products, consumption in 2023 is predicted to increase by 5% to 2 million bales.