When Wishnutama Kusubandio was appointed as the Tourism and Creative Economy Minister, he was given a difficult but doable mission: Bring in many foreign tourists and make them spend much money in the country.

There may be many ways to achieve this, such as promotional events abroad and improved transportation at home, so that more foreigners will come and enjoy the beauty of the country’s nature.

However, there is another thing Wishnutama believes could be an effective driver to lure more tourists: creating world-class events such as major art festivals, musical performances, sport events and business gatherings, all of which could lure huge numbers of tourists.

“There will be many events we can seriously pursue in the future and that could become massive pull factors to attract visitors,” Wishnutama in his speech at an event to mark the transfer of duty from his predecessor, Arif Yahya, in Jakarta on Wednesday.

“Tourism is more interesting when [we use] creativity to [create a product] that can be turned into a tourist attraction. We will create attraction; we will not only rely on nature, as nature is a gift, but how we make it a major attraction is very important,” he added.

With years of experiences in the television and creative industries, Wishnutama, the creative director behind the opening and closing ceremonies of the 2018 Asian Games, believes world-class events could become catalysts to lure foreign tourists, in addition to Indonesia’s beautiful nature.

Indonesia already has at least 100 big events a year. However, instead of focusing on the quantity of events, Wishnutama said improving the quality was more important for the future.

Popular

PDI-P will likely be part of opposition: Ganjar

Indonesia one step from Olympics after beating South Korea

Bahlil leads task force to boost sugar, bioethanol production in Papua