Indonesia believes the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) will open up opportunities to increase exports of footwear.

The country’s shoe exports to RCEP countries reached 29 percent of total exports in 2020 followed by the United States at around 27 percent. RCEP participating countries are the second largest footwear export destination for Indonesia after the European Union.RCEP countries have become an important market, especially China, which showed a large increase in imports in the period 2019 and 2020.So for the Indonesian footwear industry, the ratification of the RCEP is quite urgent.In terms of market segment, Indonesian footwear products have a branded sports shoe market segment while China dominates the export of cheap footwear which also enters various countries.

But the footwear industry faces challenges in maintaining competitiveness for the domestic market.The free trade commitment contained in the RCEP will directly allow the entry of cheap products from abroad.Efforts to maintain competitiveness have not been followed by the readiness of the domestic upstream industry in supplying raw materials. Most of the raw materials are still imported from abroad, because the domestic textile industry has not fully met the needs. In the context of increasing exports, it is also necessary to maintain the domestic market and one way to do that is to maintain competitiveness.