DTI Central Visayas Office
Release Date: January 27, 2016
Reference: DTI-Region 7
dti_7@yahoo.com / dticentralvisayas@gmail.com
DTI eyes Philippines as a global hub for furniture
The Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) wants the Philippines to be a global hub for furniture and it intends to make this happen by the year 2030. To meet this target, the agency has been supporting the local furniture industry in stepping up efforts to make their products even more competitive in the international market.
To increase its share abroad, the local industry has engaged in various programs that can help further advance the skills involved in creating consistently stylish, up-to-date designs, maintaining quality control in its products, and through innovatively using local, sustainable materials.
Chamber of Furniture Industries of the Philippines, Inc. (CFIP), a national group of firms, chapters, and affiliates that work together for the mutual benefit and the sustainable growth of the Philippine furniture industry, said that the main strength of the industry is on design, especially the parts and pieces that use sustainable materials or indigenous components such as abaca, bamboo, coco coir, buri, andpina fiber.
Already, a market abroad exists for Philippine-made furniture and designers like Kenneth Cobonpue have made strides by drawing a prestigious list of international customers. Trade shows regularly held in Manila and Cebu City have attracted a considerable number of foreign buyers who sell the merchandise to prominent customers that include major hotels located in key destinations.
DTI data indicated that of the USD 347B value of world production of furniture in 2012, 0.2% was accounted for by the Philippines, which shows there is room for the industry to grow.
The industry intends to increase its share in the global market to 2% by 2017. Under the roadmap, the plan is for the country's furniture exports to rise by 7% per market and to climb further by 10% in 2017.
Furniture and fixture exports have steadily increased in the last six years. Figures from the Philippine Statistics Authority showed that from USD 165.14M worth of exports in 2011, the exports grew to USD 179.71M in 2012, USD 251.05M in 2013, USD 362.73M in 2014, and USD 297.99M as of November 2015.
The local furniture industry is working closely with its stakeholders to further boost the numbers, particularly the export receipts.
The industry is targeting the medium to high-end segment of the traditional markets such as North America, Europe, Middle East and Japan; Asia especially Kuala Lumpur, Jakarta, Shanghai, Ho Chi Minh, Bangkok and Singapore; and BRICs or Brazil, Russia, India, China.
For information on the services of the DTI visit http://www.dti.gov.ph
