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Govt eyes tourism to boost forex
Last year’s low realization of foreign exchange (forex) earnings from the tourism sector has prompted the government to lower its projection this year to US$17
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span>Last year’s low realization of foreign exchange (forex) earnings from the tourism sector has prompted the government to lower its projection this year to US$17.6 billion from a targeted $20 billion.
Bank Indonesia (BI) recorded $15.6 billion in forex earnings last year, while the Tourism Ministry recorded $16 billion from 15.8 million visitors.
Regardless of the slight difference, both failed to meet the government’s initial target of $17 billion from 17 million visitors.
Tourism Minister Arief Yahya said multiple natural disasters that struck popular tourist destinations like Bali and Lombok had deterred foreign tourists from visiting the country. As a result, the government failed to meet its own forex earnings target as well as the projected number of visitors.
“The disasters made us set a rather conservative projection this year. But I’m sure we can attain more than that,” he said after attending a coordination meeting with BI and the Office of the Coordinating Maritime Affairs Minister in Jakarta.
Indonesian Hotel and Restaurant Association (PHRI) chairman Hariyadi Sukamdani seemed to share Arief’s optimism as he, too, was upbeat that the country’s tourism industry would be able to reach the government’s target.
Hariyadi said each tourist spent an average of $1,000 to $1,200 per visit, enough to fulfill the government’s projection as long as the number of visitors increased.
To attain this target, BI Governor Perry Warjiyo said the government had prepared six strategies to help boost the number of tourists, increased their length of stay in the country and, in turn, increased the number of forex earnings in order to ease the country’s current account deficit.
The first strategy was by accelerating the completion of tourism supporting infrastructure projects, including the development of the New Yogyakarta International Airport, the new rapid exit taxiway at Bali’s I Gusti Ngurah Rai International Airport and the roads near tourist destinations, he said.
The acceleration, Perry said, was aimed to ease tourists in accessing tourist destinations, which could increase the number of visitors to the country’s many destinations.
Second, he said, was by encouraging the development of new tourist attractions through cultural festivals.
Perry added that the government would increase the quality of existing tourist attractions, like Komodo National Park in East Nusa Tenggara and Lake Toba in North Sumatra, to entice foreign tourists to extend their stay, resulting in them spending more money at those destinations.
“We will also ensure rupiah circulation, including ATM availability, money changer services and payment channel operations, along with the development of electronic transactions that will run smoothly to cater for tourists’ transactions at their destinations,” he said.
But before they could get tourist to extend their stay, the destinations need to have tour packages that could entice tourists.
Haryadi said it was about time that the government shifted its focus on promoting tour packages from just “Wonderful Indonesia” branding as many hotels or tour operators have long prepared these types of packages to tourists.
“The branding has been proven to be successful, but it has not yet been able to sell any tourism products. So, I think it’s time for them to help us sell tourism packages,” he told The Jakarta Post.
Perry added that the government was committed to increasing the quality of the destinations’ amenities through accelerating the land acquisition process in priority destinations such as Lake Toba in North Sumatra and Borobudur temple in Central Java.
As for developing local tourism industries, the government launched the microcredit program (KUR) for tourism last year to help support local tourism-related businesses such as souvenir shops, restaurants and cafés.
However, the Office of the Coordinating Economic Minister’s undersecretary for macroeconomy and finance, Iskandar Simorangkir, said the ministry had yet to receive the report of the KUR’s total disbursement from banks.
Perry said the government was preparing a crisis management standard operating procedure for the tourism industry as well as establishing a crisis management forum in several regions that aimed to anticipate and mitigate the impact of natural disasters at tourist destinations.
