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By APD writer Maverick
**JAKARTA, Jan. 18 (APD)— **Indonesia is now intensifying efforts to regain the dominating arrival of Chinese tourists in its ultimate destination of Bali, highly expected to vibrate tourism in the resort island after has been deteriorating in the last few months due to the ensuing volcanic event.
Besides saving the tourism in Bali, Indonesia also expected arrivals of more Chinese tourists would significantly support government’s efforts to meet the targets set on tourism sector which has been set as a leading industry in the country.
Indonesia’s Tourism Ministry has initially set targets to see arrivals of foreign tourists at 17 million and 20 million ones for this year and next year respectively.
Influx of Chinese tourists in Bali have been dominating the arrival of foreign tourists in the last few years, brushing aside Singapore, Malaysia, Australia and Japan which used to dominate the figure.
With outbound tourist of more than 120 million ones, China is apparently world’s largest market in tourism industry.
The volcano eruption event in Bali, that has been ensuing since September, has drastically depleted the arrivals of foreign tourists, including from China, leaving the majority tourism-related business in the island faced unprecedented difficult times since then.
Brief closure of Bali airport and issuance of travel warnings by governments of countries supplying the most tourists to Indonesia have made potential foreign tourists cancelled their trip plans to Bali due to the volcanic event.
The highest alert status on the volcano which has not been downgraded also contributed to the drop of foreign tourists, prompting safety concerns for foreigners planning to travel to Bali.
“We realized that all of these have created sensitive issue for foreign market. We have set strategies to address this issue to regain foreign tourists, particularly from China. This market is very very important to Indonesia’s tourism,” Deputy Assistant for Asia Pacific Market Development at Indonesia Tourism ministry Vincensius Jemadu told APD in a recent interview in Bali.
Bali saw foreign tourist arrival drop down
to 70 percent during the volcanic events, he added.
Bali, which was picked as world’s best destination by TripAdvisor last year, contributed the most foreign tourist arrivals to Indonesia, followed by capital city of Jakarta and other other regions.
Indonesian statistics bureau announced that Bali received
1.43 million Chinese tourists in the first 11 months last year, contributed around 25 percent to total foreign tourists visited Bali throughout the period with sharp arrival decrease figures were seen September and November.
Expiration of China’s travel warning on January 5 without being followed by further notice has a made Bali saw a bit increasing Chinese tourists arrival recently, Jemadu added.
To heed up such a situation Jemadu said Indonesia has set intensive promotion and tour sales package programs slated to be held in several Chinese cities this month and intensifying cooperation with Chinese airlines.
He said government would provide incentives for passengers and Chinese airlines serving direct flights to Bali from Chinese cities.
The program would also be featured with official explanation on the current situation in Bali related to the volcano eruption event.
“The area declared as red zones were only 2 percent of overall Bali land. The rest areas are safe for tourists. Government has set top priority to assure the safety and security for tourists visiting Bali,” he pointed out, saying that this message should be understood by potential Chinese tourists.
To address the safety for foreign tourists, Jemadu said that government has set contingency plans should Bali airport has to be closed again due to volcanic eruption.
The plans were including provision of land transport for the tourists to go to nearest airports around Bali in Lombok, Surabaya and Banyuwangi, easing the tourists to return to their origin countries.
“We should hope for the best, should not hope for the worse amid this situation,” he said. Jemadu said that everything now runs normally in Bali at present.
In the promotion and sales program, government would also promote and sell tour packages to new ten destinations other than Bali that spread across the nation.
“Seven of those ten new destinations were marine-related spots which highly favored by Chinese tourists,” he added.
The tourism promotion program in Bali this month would also be optimally used to attract Chinese holiday makers to spend their Chinese New Year holiday season to Bali.
He added that his ministry has set coordination with China consulate general office in Bali and tourism stakeholders in the island to hold various events in celebrating the Chinese New Year.
Jemadu put high hope on the upcoming Chinese New Year season to become the pivot point for the recovery of tourism industry in Bali with increasing Chinese tourists coming back again to Bali.
“We expect the recovery may reach 60 to 70 percent from the current condition,” Jemadu said.
(ASIA PACIFIC DAILY)
