A

s Indonesia experiences growth in its middle class, the government of New Zealand says it hopes to attract more tourists from the Southeast Asian country particularly by offering special itineraries in winter.

Tourism New Zealand regional manager for South and South East Asia Stephen Dixon said that Indonesia was currently New Zealand'€™s 25th largest market when it came to tourism and the number of arrivals continued to rise.

'€œWe are seeing great growth of Indonesian tourists to New Zealand, of which the arrivals have doubled over the last five years. Last year, it was 7 percent. Now we are at an all time high, just over 15,000,'€ Dixon told The Jakarta Post recently.

According to Dixon, New Zealand recorded fewer than 3 million visitors per year with 62 percent of the tourists from Asia.

'€œYou'€™ve got 250 million people in Indonesia so we'€™ve got a good base to work from. And right now we'€™re at 15,000, and we'€™re happy with that, next year we look to attract 20,000 and we will continue to get double digit growth out of this market,'€ he said.

'€œThere'€™s more Indonesians traveling globally than any time in history, so we believe that New Zealand is a great fit for the travelers that are going international'€ he continued.

New Zealand is famous for its picturesque landscape, indigenous culture and also the original set of Hobbiton from the major box office Lord of the Rings trilogy.

Data from the Central Statistics Agency (BPS), however, shows that the number of Indonesians traveling to international destinations dropped 3.54 percent from 3.3 million to 3.2 million in the same period last year, particularly amid the steep depreciation of the rupiah against the US dollar over the year.

New Zealand Tourism Public Relations Manager for South and South East Asia Jacqueline Smith said that New Zealand basically targeted tourists from the upper middle class, who were unlikely affected by the economic situation.

'€œThose people aren'€™t usually affected so much by the economy, spending an average of 3,700 New Zealand dollars on a trip, they ride out the financial storm,'€ she said.

Dixon said that the tourism board had prepared several strategies to attract more arrivals from Indonesia during the upcoming school holiday in the middle of the year.

'€œWe work with local travel agents to build itineraries around the key travel dates. Those are fantastic times to come to New Zealand during the winter. Its also time for the travelers to experience something different. Winter in new Zealand is a magical time,'€ Dixon said.

'€œNew Zealand is attractive to families because New Zealand is a very easy country to move around as a group, [it'€™s also] for those families that want to go to exotic destinations, and New Zealand speaks to that,'€ he said.