T

he second International Furniture Expo (IFEX) will be held at the Jakarta International Expo (JIExpo) next year and the government is expecting to book US$1.2 billion in transactions.

Trade Ministry director general for national export development Nus Nuzulia Ishak said Tuesday around $400 million of that target would be from on-the-spot purchases and the remainder would be from follow up orders.

'€œWe hope IFEX 2015 will further spur growth in the local furniture and craft industry and encourage innovation and creativity in local artisans,'€ she said.

The annual furniture expo will be organized by the Indonesia Rattan Furniture and Craft Association (AMKRI) and PT Dyandra UBM International on March 12-15.

Carrying the theme '€œMerging local traditions with a modern touch'€, the event will feature a wide range of products by around 700 producers and will include rattan furniture, outdoor furniture and home decor in the 60,000-square-meters space.

The first expo in March 11-14 this year was lauded a success as the on-the-spot and follow-up sales reached roughly $1 billion. It was attended by 400 companies, including 39 overseas furniture makers from 12 countries, and attracted 6,113 buyers.

Due to the success of last year, participants appear to be more enthusiastic with around 82.7 percent of the available space already booked, according to AMKRI chairman Soenoto.

Soenoto said that the exhibition would play a significant role in helping the country achieve its target of $5 billion in exports of furniture and crafts in the next four years.

Furniture exports last year totaled $1.7 billion, making Indonesia the 18th-biggest furniture exporter in the world. It still lagged behind its Southeast Asian peers including Vietnam with $5.4 billion (seventh) and Malaysia in 11th with $2.3 billion.

Exported handicrafts brought in $669.1 million last year.

The Trade Ministry targets forestry product exports, including furniture and handicrafts, to surge by between 5.5 percent and 6.5 percent to $9.4 billion and $9.5 billion this year.

At the same time, the ministry aims to grab between $721 million and $728 million from handicraft exports, an increase of between 7 percent and 8 percent from last year.

Main target destinations are traditional buyers, such as China (with expected growth of 19.6 percent), Japan (1.47 percent), the United States (10.1 percent); South Korea (10.5 percent) and India (17.2 percent).

Furniture exports rose slightly by 1.24 percent to $626.5 million in the January to April this year from last year, while handicraft shipments surged by 2.75 percent to $229.5 million during the period.

The furniture and handicraft industry is labor-intensive and it employs 2.1 million workers, more than 500,000 are artisans.