T

he government has issued permits for the addition of 243,000 seats for air and sea travelers in anticipation of the growing number of revelers for the upcoming Christmas and New Year festivities.

The Transportation Ministry said the permit was effective from Monday with 33,006 seats available for airline passengers and 210,708 seats for those who want to travel by ship. The ministry will possibly add more seats during peak days.

'€œWe can add more seats anytime during peak periods that are projected to take place on Dec. 21 for Christmas holiday and Dec. 28 for New Year. This is one of the periods when people travel most,'€ ministry air transportation director general Herry Bakti S. Gumay said Monday.

The Idul Fitri holiday was Indonesia'€™s busiest travel period, he added.

Herry said that the ministry had granted the permits to some domestic airlines such as national flag carrier Garuda Indonesia and low cost carrier Citilink Indonesia and international operators like Singapore Airlines and Thai Airways.

Some routes that see an increase in flights include Jakarta'€“Surabaya (East Java), Jakarta'€“Denpasar (Bali), Jakarta'€“Medan (North Sumatra), Jakarta'€“Makassar (South Sulawesi) and Bandung (West Java)'€“Denpasar.

Meanwhile, for the international routes, the carriers add more seats on some of their routes including Jakarta'€“Singapore, Jakarta'€“Bangkok (Thailand), Jakarta'€“Hong Kong, Me-dan'€“Singapore, Surabaya'€“Singapore, Denpasar'€“Singapore and Denpasar'€“Hong Kong.

'€œWe predict that passenger load factors on each route will reach 86 percent on average and it will continue until the first week of January,'€ he continued.

Herry also said that the ministry was processing even more additional flights, which were proposed by some airlines and they planned to approve it some time near the peak season.

Mid-service airline Sriwijaya Air spokesman Agus Soedjono, said that they were ready to provide 28,200 extra seats from Dec. 20 to Jan. 5, 2014 to anticipate surging demand from customers.

In addition, sea transportation director-general Bobby R. Mamahit said that the government and private sector were going to operate 1,254 more ships during the holiday season, adding a total capacity of 210,708 passengers.

Bobby said that the government was providing ships operating in 80 pioneer routes, while the rest are going to be accommodated by state-owned shipping firm PT Pelni, state-owned river, lake and sea-crossing transportation firm PT ASDP, and the private operators such as PT Dharma Lautan Utama, PT Sumber Sumatra Raya and PT Prima Vista.

'€œWe will monitor closely 52 ports across the country that have always been very busy during holidays particularly Tanjung Priok [Jakarta], Batam [Riau Islands], Tanjung Pinang [Riau Islands] and Belawan [North Sumatra]. We have also communicated with port authorities and the police to increase safety at the ports,'€ he said.

Different from air transportation, he said that the sea transportation sector saw peaks on Dec. 23 and Jan. 6, 2014, for the Christmas and new year periods, respectively.

The ministry estimates the number of transportation passengers will increase by 9.7 percent to 13.63 million this year from 12.42 million people in the same period last year.

Sea transportation sector is projected to see the highest growth, increasing 20 percent from 882,490 people in 2012 to 1.058.998 people in 2013. The land transportation is sector that is expected to record the least increase by 2.1 percent from 2.72 million last year to 2.78 million this year.