CIDISS – Indonesia’s oleochemical industry in the last 3 years has shown positive growth. During the last 3 years, the average export volume grew 10.68% per year and the export value grew to 19.68% per year.
As for the first semester of 2018, the oleochemical industry recorded 2.39 million tons of exports with an export value of US $ 2.08 billion.
As is known, oleochemistry is one of the downstream products of palm oil, namely crude palm kernel oil (CPKO) which through 4 stages of industrial processing to produce, among others, biosurfactant products (detergent raw materials, soaps, and shampoos), lubricants / lubricants and biomaterials such as bioplastics.
Chairperson of the Indonesian Oleochemical Producers Association (APOLIN) Rapolo Hutabarat estimates that until the end of this year Indonesia’s exports of oleochemical products will reach 4.79 million tons, up from 3.6 million tons in 2017. The export value this year is predicted to reach US $ 4.17 billion, up from US $ 3.3 billion in last year.
In the next year, Rapolo is optimistic that the oleochemical industry will grow rapidly because of the continued positive global demand. He projects that export volume in 2019 will grow 12%, while the value of exports will increase by 20% compared to this year.
Rapolo said, we are optimistic because most of our products are for export purposes, around 85-90% of production. At present there are no more human needs released from oleochemical products, both in the oil drilling, steel, tire, pharmaceutical, cosmetics to household needs such as soap and others.
He explained, our traditional markets from the largest were the European Union and China, each contributing 25-30%, followed by India, South Korea and Japan. Then of course the ASEAN, the United States and Australia markets. In addition to maintaining the existing market, the Ministry of Commerce also made new market breakthroughs to Latin America, the Middle East, South Asia and Africa. This is what we expect. He also mentioned that African countries as potential markets with export growth were quite encouraging. “Africa has grown rather encouraging because there are many demand soap noodles.
At present, the installed capacity of the Indonesian oleochemical industry reaches 5.4 million tons per year, with the capacity being used around 70-75%. This number comes from 9 APOLIN member companies and 10 companies that have not joined the association.
Oleochemical export growth is certainly one of the fields that can balance the international balance of payments. In order to maintain this positive growth, support from other stakeholders is needed, especially the government as a regulator so that momentum is maintained. Such support can be in the form of export policies that can facilitate sales flows from domestic to foreign countries.
By: Ajeng Mufadillah*)