Furniture, wood & rattan
Indonesian rattan webbing and cane
Indonesia holds most of the world's rattan and restricts export of the raw material to keep the weaving industry at home. What a foreign workshop can buy is semi-finished: woven webbing in rolls, peel, core and pre-cut components. Asking for raw cane is the most common wasted month on this product.
How it leaves the country.
- Cane webbing in rolls
- Machine or hand woven sheet in the open hexagonal pattern used for chair backs and cabinet doors. Sold by the metre in a fixed roll width.
- Peel and binding cane
- The outer skin cut into strips, used for binding joints and for the edge of a webbed panel. Graded on width and on colour consistency.
- Round core
- The inner pith extruded into round or flat lengths. This is the material for basketry and for woven seat frames.
- Pre-cut components
- Bent and cut parts made to a drawing. It moves more value to Indonesia and it removes the steaming and bending work from your own shop.
How it is graded.
Rattan is not one plant. Several species are traded under the name and they differ in diameter, colour and how they take a bend, which is why a specification names a species rather than a grade.
- Raw export is restricted
- Indonesian policy keeps unprocessed cane in the country to protect domestic weaving. Semi-finished and finished goods are what leave.1
- Species matters more than grade
- Manau, sega and other species have different diameters and different working properties. Name the species and the diameter in the contract.
- Colour consistency across a roll
- Natural material varies, and a cabinet front made from two batches shows it. Specify tolerance and ask for the order to come from one production run.
- Moisture and brittleness
- Over-dried cane cracks when it is worked and damp cane grows mould in transit. This is the balance a good supplier manages and a poor one does not.
- Bleaching and fumigation
- Much webbing is sulphur treated or bleached for colour. Some destinations care about residues, and it belongs in the specification either way.
How it is packed.
- Rolls in cartons
- Webbing rolled and boxed, with the roll width fixed by the loom. Crushing in transit shows as a permanent distortion in the weave.
- Bundles for cane and core
- Tied bundles by length and diameter, wrapped against moisture.
- Volume rather than weight
- Light and bulky, so a container fills by space with weight to spare. Plan the order in cubic metres.
- Pallet marking
- Wooden packaging under the load carries the heat treatment mark, checked separately from the goods.2
Where it grows.
Cirebon
Java
The rattan processing and weaving cluster on the north coast of West Java, and the usual source for webbing.
Central Sulawesi
Sulawesi
A major growing area supplying raw cane into the Javanese processing industry.
South Kalimantan
Borneo
Rattan gardens and collection feeding the same processing chain.
Origins with a protected name.
Names the trade contracts on, most of them on the Indonesian register of geographical indications.
Documentation, where applicable.
- Phytosanitary certificate
- A plant product, so plant health applies and the destination's requirements decide the treatment.3
- Fumigation certificate
- Commonly required for untreated plant material, and the treatment record travels with the goods.
- ISPM 15 mark
- On the wooden packaging rather than on the cargo. A missing mark holds the container regardless.2
- Certificate of origin
- Which form applies depends on the destination and the preference scheme in force with Indonesia.
Questions buyers ask.
Can I buy raw rattan cane from Indonesia?
Not in the way most buyers mean. Export of unprocessed cane is restricted by Indonesian policy, and the purpose of that policy is to keep the weaving work in the country. What you can buy is semi-finished material and finished goods, which for most workshops is what they actually needed anyway.
Why does my webbing arrive different from the sample?
Usually because it came from a different production run. Rattan is a natural material and colour drifts between batches and between seasons. The fix is to specify the tolerance, order the whole quantity from one run, and keep a retained sample sealed at the supplier.
Is Indonesian rattan better than Vietnamese or Filipino?
Indonesia holds the largest share of the world's growing stock and the deepest processing industry, which mostly shows up as availability and species range rather than as a quality difference. What decides a given order is the workshop rather than the country.
What does your service cost?
Five per cent of the order value, paid by you and never by the factory. A factory audit starts at $250 depending on location. We work with orders from $10,000 per shipment.
Tell us what you need.
Give us the specification and the destination port. We come back with producer options and an indicative price. Our fee is 5 % of the order value, paid by you and never by the factory.
Sources
- 1What the Indonesian rattan export ban means for markets and collectors. Forest Policy and Economics. Checked 3 August 2026.
- 2ISPM 15, regulation of wood packaging material in international trade. International Plant Protection Convention (IPPC), FAO. Checked 3 August 2026.
- 3Badan Karantina Indonesia, the national quarantine agency. Republic of Indonesia. Checked 3 August 2026.