Despite the relatively high production output of seaweed in Indonesia, the export market for value-added seaweed is pretty much a niche industry that is still occupied by a small number of national manufacturers. Products such as seaweed drink and seaweed candy are still a considerably small business in comparison to the overall export volume and market size of raw or dried seaweed. As a reference, collectively, the national market can only accommodate around 20% of the import demand of value-added seaweed from China and Hong Kong that reached 80 MT last year, and 30 MT so far in 2020. One supplier pointed out that most suppliers prefer to sell their seaweed in its raw or dried form as this process is more simple.