The Surakarta City Government stated that Solo has great potential in the textile sector, one of which can be seen from the many batik industries in the area. "Solo City itself is the largest batik city in Indonesia," said Surakarta City Secretary (Sekda) Ahyani at the Solo Textile Mart 2022 activity in Solo, Thursday (17/3/2022). He said the existence of Kampung Batik Laweyan and Kauman was proof that the textile industry, including batik, could be a shopping commodity for the community, especially tourists. "In this case, textile commodities are the main focus of the batik industry and its derivatives, such as fashion handicrafts and accessories to interior decorations," he said. 

However, he admits, currently there are complaints from batik craftsmen regarding the increase in the price of raw materials following the lack of supply of raw fabric materials, especially for the batik industry. He said this condition was not only experienced by batik craftsmen but also other textile commodity industry players. "It must be understood that this is happening not only in Indonesia but also almost all over the world due to the failure of cotton harvests in America and other cotton-producing countries in the world," he said.

Responding to these conditions, one of the efforts made by the Surakarta City Government is to organize a Solo Textile Mart with the theme Lets Talk About Textile which is expected to become a national discussion event for textile industry resource parties. "Therefore, I hope that this discussion can provide a solution to deal with the increase in the price of textile raw materials. There must be collaboration with the parties to develop independent cotton cultivation as an effort to meet the supply of cotton for fabric commodities for batik industry players and their derivatives," he said.

He also hopes that in the future there will be support from the central government regarding national policies to support independent cotton cultivation. On the same occasion, the Head of the Surakarta City Cooperatives and SMEs Service, Wahyu Kristina, said that the solution to the shortage of cotton was by cultivating cotton.

"In addition to finding solutions, it is hoped that networking and strengthening collaboration between policy makers and textile industry players and their derivatives will also be created," he said.