JAKARTA – The visit of King Salman bin Abdulazis Al Saud of Saudi Arabia to Indonesia in March 2017 has inspired Middle East tourists to spend their summer long stay family vacation. “King Salman Route” indulged tourists with premium standard services and facilities.
To further promote Indonesia world class wonders and its premium properties, Indonesian Ministry of Tourism conducted sales mission series on 22 to 25 of October 2017 in Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Seven tourism industry have met with hundreds of travel experts and advisors in three cities, Dammam, Riyadh and Jeddah. This event was an important hub for networking and business transactions between the tourism industry from Indonesia and Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
During the event, Nia Niscaya, Director of International Promotion in Europe, Middle East, America and Africa Region, Ministry of Tourism, Republic of Indonesia, highlighted main topics that include Indonesia ambitious goals to reach 20 million international arrivals by 2019, 10 Beyond Bali destinations, simplified regulations for tourists, awards, and plans for 2018.
From information technologies perspective, Indonesia has established a Go Digital strategy by developing a digital market place called TXI, stands for Tourism Exchange Indonesia that can be accessed through www.indonesia.travel website. Currently, there have been 5 thousand Indonesian suppliers registered at TXI, enabling netizens to book Indonesia travel packages, accommodation, quicker and more efficient.
In 2017, Indonesia has been developing 20,000 tourism village homestays built primarily in the ten priority destinations as a part of an elaborate program with the aim of ultimately developing a 100,000 homestays by 2019. The goal is to maximize benefits to local communities and diversify product offerings to visitors.
Indonesia continues refining its air connectivity by what they call the “3A Collaboration: Airlines, Airports, and Air Navigation”. This strategic plan aims to increase the number of airlines flying to Indonesia, the destinations they fly to, and their schedule frequency. Indonesia also has been improving many existing airports and building new ones. They are also using sophisticated air traffic control and navigation to maximize use of air corridors and airspace throughout the Indonesian archipelago.
Nia Niscaya also shared Indonesia commitment to ready itself for the 18th edition of Asian Games, an important regional multi-sports event in Asia that will be co hosted in two Indonesian cities, Jakarta and Palembang, from August 18 – September 2, 2018. Approximately 462 events of 40 sports and disciplines will be featured in the Games.
She concluded that Indonesia is targeting 15 million visitors by the end of 2017. From January to August 2017 the number of international tourists coming to Indonesia had increased 25.68 %, from 7.35 million in 2016 to 9.24 million visitors in 2017. The room occupancy rate of star hotels in 27 provinces in January to August 2017 had reached an average of 54.59%, a 1.85 points increase compared to 52.74% in 2016. Despite of 2,53% decline on the Middle Eastern tourists visiting Indonesia from January to August 2017 compared to previous year with 172.653 visitors, Indonesia remained in full gear with its sales missions in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to end this year record with a better figure.