APVI Secretary General Gave Advice to Chinese Exporters

[2FIRSTS summary report]

On October 20, IECIE Vape Show had its opening at the JI Expo, Jakarta. The exhibition covers an area of 12,000 square meters with expected attendance from 100+ exhibitors and 10,000+ visitors.

Hallway to the entrance

2FIRSTS, as the global cooperative media of IECIE and strategic cooperative media of the Electronic Cigarette Professional Committee of China Electronics Chamber of Commerce (ECCC), presented the show to keep all vaping industry practitioners updated about the dynamics of the Southeast Asian market.

2FIRSTS's booth

At the show, 2FIRSTS has a press room at B1A08 welcoming everyone to drop by and have a chat. Garindra Kartasasmita, secretary general of APVI, namely Asosiasi Personal Vaporizer Indonesia (Indonesian Vapor Entrepreneurs Association), was its first heavyweight guest.

handshake with 2FIRSTS

APVI boasts 1200+ members including retailers, distributors, importers, and manufacturers and is considered one of the largest associations in Indonesia. In the press room, Garindra talked about the status quo and forecast for the Indonesian vape market and gave some suggestions to the Chinese exporters.

According to Garindra, Indonesia's vape market has been growing at an annual rate of some 50% since 2013, then witnessed a 7% fall in 2021 from the aftermath of Covid. It is expected to rebound with an estimated 50% growth this year. The Southeast Asian vape market is promising, said Garindra, but the neighboring countries need to keep up with the pace of Indonesia's regulatory system. Malaysia is an example as it features a large market with weak regulation. In this case, different aspects of the industry are not growing together but killing each other. In comparison, Indonesia's regulation is well-established with a fixed excise rate for each kind of product such as HTP, and open and closed systems. There's also a new e-liquid standard proposed to better regulate flavors but it is still underway for more data from tests and scientific research.

Asked how China's vape industry can help its Indonesian counterpart, Garindra offered a highly relative suggestion for all Chinese manufacturers because APVI has been dealing with piles of inquiries about product compliance and establishing enclave factories inside Indonesia for the past 6 months. If the target market remains the US, UK, Middle East, and so on, said Garindra, they may build factories in Batam, an Indonesian island designated as a Free Trade Zone, where Chinese companies can ship all the raw materials there without paying any tariff, and then products can be exported easily. If the target market is Indonesia, those companies can set up factories on islands including Java, where the manufacturer would directly face the local market.

Later on, Garindra will join 2FIRSTS for more profound discussions about compliance in Indonesia.

For more information about IECIE Vape Show, please visit the special site.