TheJakartaPost

Please Update your browser

Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.

Jakarta Post

Garuda eyes outbound passengers to Australia

Garuda Indonesia is eyeing double-digit growth in Indonesian passengers traveling to Australia as it sees potential beyond the huge number of Australians who visit Indonesia

Farida Susanty (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Mon, September 26, 2016

Share This Article

Change Size

Garuda eyes outbound passengers to Australia

G

aruda Indonesia is eyeing double-digit growth in Indonesian passengers traveling to Australia as it sees potential beyond the huge number of Australians who visit Indonesia.

Garuda expects the number of passengers traveling from Indonesia to Australia to reach 80,000 from September this year to April next year, a surge of 60 percent from the 50,000 passengers recorded during the same period in the previous year.

To achieve the target, Garuda will extend its cooperation with Australian government agency Tourism Australia. Cooperation between the two entities began in 2014 and covers areas such as digital marketing, social media, television and print media.

“We will cooperate to promote tourism between the two countries,” Garuda Indonesia commercial director A. Toni Soetirto said.

In the first half of this year, the number of Indonesian nationals leaving to Australia rose by 7.9 percent year-on-year (yoy) to 73,500 people.

Garuda currently serves 33 weekly flights connecting Denpasar and Jakarta to three major Australian cities, namely Sydney, Melbourne and Perth.

The opening of additional routes is on the horizon. Toni hopes that one day, Garuda might fly to other cities in Australia such as Adelaide and Brisbane. Previously, Garuda scrapped its route from Denpasar to Brisbane due to low passenger loads. Passenger load measures the capacity utilization of an airline.

“If the demand is good, we can reopen the route,” he added.

The passenger load for existing routes stands at 76 percent on average. It is expected that this will climb to 79 percent by the end of the year.

There are still more Australians visiting Indonesia than there are Indonesians visiting Australia.

The number of Australians visiting Indonesia stood at 572,362 in the first half of this year, up by 8.8 percent from the same period a year ago.

Tourism Australia regional general manager for South Asia, South East Asia and Gulf Countries Michael Newcombe said Indonesia was still in the 12th position of countries with the most number of tourist arrivals in Australia.

“We’d like to see it break into the top ten within the next 12 to 18 months. If we continue growing at the rate that we currently are, I think that’s not an overly ambitious target,” he said.

Newcombe said the key to increasing the number of Indonesian arrivals would lie in direct flights provided by companies such as Garuda. Improvements in visa processing services are also important.

“What you have seen in the last six months, Australia has progressively changed its visa policy for Indonesians visiting Australia. Now, you can get three multiple entry visas as opposed to what it used to be,” he added.

Indonesia has also arranged a free-visa policy for Australia, in addition to 168 other countries granted the same privilege in the country’s bid to attract 20 million foreign visitors by 2019.

--------------

To receive comprehensive and earlier access to The Jakarta Post print edition, please subscribe to our epaper through iOS' iTunes, Android's Google Play, Blackberry World or Microsoft's Windows Store. Subscription includes free daily editions of The Nation, The Star Malaysia, the Philippine Daily Inquirer and Asia News.

For print subscription, please contact our call center at (+6221) 5360014 or subscription@thejakartapost.com

{

Your Opinion Matters

Share your experiences, suggestions, and any issues you've encountered on The Jakarta Post. We're here to listen.

Enter at least 30 characters
0 / 30

Thank You

Thank you for sharing your thoughts. We appreciate your feedback.