Kemenperin Stresses Importance of Designer Competency to Push Indonesia's Muslim Fashion Industry

JAKARTA – The Industry Ministry (Kemenperin) is actively pushing Indonesia’s Muslim fashion industry to develop further by encouraging them to diversify their products and improve product quality in order to be more competitive in the global market.

These measures are in line with the terms outlined in the Making Indonesia 4.0 roadmap, which names the textiles and clothing industries as one of the country’s key industrial sectors whose development will be prioritized by the government.

Industry Minister (Mendag) Agus Gumiwang Kartasasmita said that the country’s textiles and clothing industry is an important contributor to the national economy due to its export performance, its benefits to the textiles industry and foreign exchange earnings.

“The clothing industry exported US$7.04 billion of goods throughout 2020. It also made up 6.76% of the non-energy processing industry’s contribution to the gross domestic product (GDP) in that same year,” the Minister said through a written statement on Wednesday (24/3).

According to the Kemenperin’s Director for Miscellaneous and Small-to-Medium Scale (IKM) Clothing, Chemicals and Crafts E. Ratna Utarianingrum, young Indonesian Muslim fashion designers and business owners need a proper platform to develop their capacity and skills to better promote their goods abroad and fulfill their potential.

“We realize that designers play a huge role in developing the fashion industry as they are able to come up with innovative ideas and can influence and create trends in the Indonesian fashion industry,” Ratna explained.

To help bolster the industry, the Kemenperin is holding a variety of programs such as the national Modest Fashion Project (MOFP) competition. This competition was held to help achieve the target of having Indonesia become one of the world’s leading hubs for Muslim fashion. The MOFP is a design and business concept competition held by the Kemenperin’s IKM and Miscellaneous Industries (IKMA) department since 2018. The competition is returning in 2021. The top 20 finalists of the competition will be eligible to take part in assistance programs held by the Kemenperin’s IKMA department.

Ratna added that the increasing number of Muslims around the world is one of the reasons why the global Muslim fashion industry is growing. Data from the 2020/2021 State Global Islamic Economy Report showed that Muslim fashion consumption in 2019 reached US$277 billion and is projected to reach US$311 billion in 2024.

Indonesia’s Muslim fashion consumption, which reached US$16 billion in 2019, is the fifth largest in the world behind Iran, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. The Kemenperin sees this as an opportunity for Indonesian Muslim fashion businesses to increase their global stature.

The increasing development of Indonesia’s Muslim fashion industry has not gone unnoticed by the world. The 2020/2021 State of Global Islamic Economy report also revealed that Indonesia’s industry is the third best developed after the United Arab Emirates and Turkey.

What are your thoughts on the government’s efforts to improve the competitiveness of our leading industrial subsectors? Send us your ideas and suggestions through the Indonesia Development Forum’s social media pages!