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Indonesia en route to achieving 8.5 million foreign arrivals this year: Sandiaga
The tourism minister expressed confidence that Indonesia would meet this year’s target of 8.5 foreign arrivals after reaching 50 percent of that figure as of May.
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A woman takes a stroll on April 30, 2023 past empty beach chairs in Sanur, Bali. (JP/Ni Komang Erviani)
R
ecovery continues apace in Indonesia’s tourism industry, with the number of foreign arrivals in the first five months of 2023 increasing 312 percent year-on-year.
Tourism and Creative Economy Minister Sandiaga Uno said the progress so far suggested that the country was on track to meeting its goal.
“Our target for 2023 is 8.5 million foreign tourists. As of May we had 4.25 million foreign visitors, and we believe we can achieve this target,” Sandiaga told a press briefing on Tuesday.
The COVID-19 pandemic and international travel restrictions took an enormous toll on Indonesian tourism. The country attracted an estimated 11 million foreign visitors between 2020 and 2022, compared to 16 million in 2019 alone.
Data from Statistics Indonesia (BPS) show that Malaysia contributed the largest number of inbound travelers in May with 124,617, followed by Singapore with 111,259 and then by Australia, Timor-Leste and China.
Millions of foreign travelers visit Bali annually, but the number of visitors from China remains far below what it was before the pandemic disrupted the industry.
"We hope China will [rank] second like it was in 2019, or first like was in 2018,” Tjok Bagus Pemayun, head of the Bali Tourism Agency, told reporters on Tuesday.
