The government is so confident that the number of foreign tourist arrivals will increase this year, the Tourism and Creative Economy Ministry has set a target of 9.5 million tourists, higher than its initial target of 9.2 million.

The ministry'€™s confidence is apparently due to the number of foreign tourist arrivals in 2013, which was higher than initially predicted.

The ministry had previously predicted foreign tourits arrivals would reach 8.6 million in 2013, due to the slow recovery in the global economy. However, the Central Statistics Agency (BPS) announced recently that the country welcomed a total of 8.8 million foreign tourists last year.

The figure also shows that Indonesia'€™s tourist industry reaped 10.23 percent growth in foreign exchange earnings last year to US$10.05 billion, surpassing the initial target of $9.87 billion.

Tourism and Creative Economy Minister Mari Elka Pangestu said the government would focus on developing tourist sectors in 16 areas across the country that have been earmarked as national strategic tourism zones (KSPN), including Lake Toba in North Sumatra, Ende in East Nusa Tenggara (NTT), Toraja in South Sulawesi and Raja Ampat in West Papua.

According to Mari, the increased target in the number of foreign tourists would be supported by 2.74 million additional direct-flight seats to Indonesia this year, bringing the total capacity to 21.6 million seats.

BPS data shows that 71 percent of foreign tourists travel to Indonesia by air.

'€œBased on the latest World Economic Forum'€™s Travel and Tourism Competitiveness Index, Indonesia was ranked 70 out of 140 countries last year, up from 74 out of 139 countries in 2011,'€ Mari said.

She said that even though competitiveness in the industry had increased, the rank was still lower compared to neighboring countries such as Malaysia and Thailand, which were ranked 34 and 43, respectively.

'€œWe still face a lot of challenges including transportation infrastructure, as well as in the health and hygiene sector compared to other countries,'€ Mari said.

Separately, the Transportation Ministry'€™s logistics and multimodal transportation expert, Sugihardjo, said that in order to support tourism, the ministry would increase the capacity of seven seaports nationwide for the cruise sector, as well as improve the capacity of airports, especially in the eastern half of the country.

'€œWe see a lot of potential in the cruise sector, as we saw a 500 percent increase in the number of cruise passengers to 400,000 last year compared with the number in 2001,'€ he said, adding that the government hoped to see an increase to 600,000 cruise passengers in 2016.

Based on data from the ministry, the government has allocated Rp 1.7 trillion (US$139.4 million) to develop and improve capacity at seaports in the 16 KSPN areas this year, which include Sorong, West Papua; Benoa, Bali; Bima, West Nusa Tenggara (NTB), and Labuan Bajo, NTT.

The ministry is also allocating Rp 3.4 trillion this year to develop and improve airports in the country'€™s 16 prime tourist destinations.

Given the promising outlook in the tourist sector, Rio Kondo, the Accor Group'€™s vice president for development for Indonesia and Malaysia, said the group planned to build 17 hotels across the country in 2014 and 11 others the following year.

'€œWe support the government'€™s program to expand the country'€™s tourist destinations by opening more hotels,'€ Rio said. '€œWith an estimated increase of the middle class by up to 90 million people by 2030, we think there are good prospects for the tourist industry,'€ he added.

Accor currently operates a total of 73 hotels, including those under the Ibis Budget brand and upscale hotels under its Pullman and Sofitel brands, in 24 cities across the country.