Jakarta (ANTARA) - Minister of Cooperatives and Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs), Teten Masduki, has emphasized the importance of building digital literacy among e-commerce consumers to prevent them from being deceived into buying cheap but poor-quality imported products.

"Consumers in the online market are easily tempted by cheap imported products, and many of them are of deceiving quality," he said in a statement from his ministry on Saturday.

At an event marking National Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprise (MSME) Day, Masduki said that if consumers become more educated about online shopping, sales of higher-quality local products would also increase.

He noted that the digital economy is growing rapidly, leading to increasingly fierce competition among large companies and international e-commerce platforms.

"This also poses challenges, particularly the practice of predatory pricing," he added.

Masduki expressed concern over the dominance of imported products on e-commerce platforms, pointing out that around 90 percent of goods on such platforms are imported, making it difficult for local MSMEs to compete.

The Trade Ministry has issued a regulation to provide comprehensive protection to MSMEs in the digital economy era.

According to Masduki, the digital market is an important accelerator for MSME business development.

Citing the 2022 MSME Empowerment Report, he said that digitalization has helped improve MSME business performance.

With digitalization, sales increased by 84.2 percent, operational effectiveness improved by 73 percent, market expansion reached 62.8 percent, and cost efficiency improved by 50.7 percent, he said.

Masduki expressed hope that the private sector will continue to prioritize domestic products and collaborate closely with MSME actors, the government, and other private parties.

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