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Wonderful Indonesia Festival to be held in Oman
The event has a mission to dismiss the negative portrayal of Indonesia as a country that provides unprofessional migrant workers.
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Dramatic sunset at Pasir Panjang Beach, Kupang, East Nusa Tenggara. (Shutterstock/File)
Tourism ministry is set to hold the Wonderful Indonesia Festival in Oman from Oct. 2 - 6.
According to the ministry’s deputy minister for Overseas Promotion, I Gde Pitana the event has a mission to help in achieving the 20 million overseas tourists target by 2019 as well as dismissing the negative portrayal of Indonesia as a country that provides unprofessional migrant workers.
“We will show that Indonesia has a lot more to offer and has a world-class beauty. This festival will hold a table-top industrial gathering on Oct. 3 at the Sheraton Muscat hotel. This is where tourism practitioners from Indonesia and Oman will meet and extend their network,” Pitana said.
“The Middle Eastern market is huge especially with their spending that is above average. They usually travel for eight and a half days with an average spending of US$1,190 per-visitor. In Oman, our target is the Middle Eastern families who usually take summer vacations for two until three months,” added the ministry's deputy assistant for Europe, the United States, Middle East and Africa tourism promotion, Nia Niscaya.
Moreover, Nia said that Indonesia is trying to keep up with Malaysia that welcomes 300,000 Middle Eastern tourists and Thailand with 800,000 Middle Eastern tourists.
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For the festival, the ministry is bringing four companies to Oman namely Astadala Tour, PT Indonesia Tur Arabia / Go Indonesia, PT. Tambatan Hati Tour & Travel and Travel In Style.
The ministry is also slated to present a seven-member dance group who will perform at the diplomatic reception hosted by the Indonesian Embassy in Oman on Oct. 2.
“The dances that will be performed represent Bali, West Java, West Sumatra and Jakarta. There will be four dances such as Bajidor which is a collaboration between Sundanese Jaipong dance and Balinese dance, Gebyar Bali which is a new dance that showcases the Indonesian youth spirit at a people’s party, Galenyek which is the new version of the traditional Minang dance and Lenggang Betawi," Nia said.
The festival will also be held at Muscat Avenue Mall from Oct. 5 - 6.
For the Middle Eastern market, tourism minister Arief Yahya said to promote destinations that have won the World Best Halal Destination awards.
The ministry is targeting to attract five million international tourists for halal tourism in 2019. Currently the number is between two to three million tourists.
“Our 2019 target is five million, twice from the current number,” told Arief.
According to the report from Global Muslim Travel Index (GMTI) the number of tourists for this segment is expected to reach 168 million, an increase from the year of 2015 that had 117 million. GMTI also shows that Indonesia is in the fourth place for the most favorite halal destination among the Organization of Islamic Cooperation countries. (asw)
