TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - According to Ministry of Trade’s Domestic trade General Tjahya Widayanti, the buying ability of Indonesian people has not weakened. She reasons that Indonesia’s household consumption for the use of domestic products actually increased by 26.13 percent.

Other than that, the increased consumption can also be used as a chance to improve domestic trade in goods and services.

“The improvement is our chance to trade domestic goods and services,” said Tjahya on Sunday, December 10. Data also shows that Indonesia’s economy throughout 2017 improved 5.1 percent.

Other than that, Indonesia’s export performance also improved around 14.03 percent which was 90 percent dominated by non-oil and gas export products in the processed agricultural and processed mineral industry.

Tjahya suggests that the increase in export performance can be used by domestic businesses to improve the production of high-quality domestic products that can potentially dominate domestic and global trades. “This [moment] should be used by domestic businesses to produce domestic products with good quality and are competitive,” she said.

During an event entitled Indonesian Product Day in Sarinah, Jakarta, Tjahya urged Indonesians to continue their loyalty towards domestic products. “Starting from this second, today, from ourselves, we must use Indonesian products,” she concluded.

Kartika Anggraeni