T

he weakening of the rupiah against the US dollar is expected to be a blessing in disguise for the tourism sector as foreign holidaymakers seeking affordable trips may look at the country as a potential destination, an official has said.

The Tourism and Creative Economy Ministry'€™s marketing director general, Esthy Reko Astuti, said on Friday that the dwindling rupiah, which hit Rp 11,000 per dollar this week, would help pull overseas tourists into the archipelago thanks to reasonable hotel rates, transportation fares and travel packages.

'€œWe have yet to calculate how the economic slowdown will boost foreign tourist arrivals, but it might help us to meet this year'€™s target and that would be good enough,'€ Esthy said on the sidelines of the 2013 Indonesia Tourism and Creative Economy Fair (ITCEF).

Besides enticing more visitors, she said that visiting tourists might also extend their length of stays, travel to more sites and expend more to buy goods.

Esthy said the country had targeted to attract 8.6 million foreign tourists this year compared to last year'€™s 8.04 million, a 10 percent rise from 7.65 million in 2011, according to data from the Central Statistics Agency (BPS).

Benefitting from the currency'€™s underperformance, she said the ministry had planned and conducted several promotional programs, including by holding exhibitions in targeted countries such as China.

The government hopes to see tourist arrivals from China rise by about 43 percent, from around 700,000 visitors to around 1 million visitors.

Meanwhile, Indonesian Tourism Board (BPPI) chairwoman Wiryanti said that the declining rupiah had created great momentum to capture overseas visitors from the Middle East and Europe.

Wiryanti said Indonesia should focus on tourists from the two regions, as visitors from the Middle East and Europe would likely be looking for alternatives to Egypt, which is now politically unstable.

The number of foreign visitors in the first half of 2013 grew by 7 percent to 4.15 million from 3.87 million in the same period last year, the BPS said.

The highest recorded increase was seen in visitors from the Middle East and East Asia, such as the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Saudi Arabia, Egypt, China, Hong Kong and Taiwan.

The highest growth was booked by UAE tourists with 122.4 percent, followed by those from China and Saudi Arabia with 54.2 percent and 34.3 percent, respectively.

The rise in tourists from the Middle East has been attributed to flight increases provided by Gulf carriers such as Emirates and Etihad Airways.

Data from the BPS also showed strong performance in the number of European visitors in the first half of this year despite the eurozone crisis, with the number of Russian tourists showing the highest increase with a 25 percent from the same period last year, followed by Germans and the Dutch at 15 percent each.