Growth in arrivals for Indonesian tourism between January and March 2013

JAKARTA- Since the beginning of the year, the total number of foreign visitors to Indonesia grew by 6 percent to 2,018,059 from 1,903,796 in the same period last year, Central Statistics Agency (BPS) data said. March was even close to the record of December 2012 with total foreign tourist arrivals up by 10.13% to 725,316 people.

The excellent result –especially for a month considered as low season for Indonesia- prompted a satisfied comment from Indonesia Tourism and Creative Economy Minister Mari Elka Pangestu: “Over 700,000 foreign tourists [in March] is a record for us because normally that number is only achieved in the high season that falls between July and December. We hope this growth will lead to higher-spending tourists with longer stays in Indonesia,” she said in Jakarta on Wednesday. The precedent record was reached in December, when the world’s largest archipelago recorded 766,966 foreign travellers.

The fastest growing markets in Asia were from Taiwan (up by 27.2%), China PRC (24.8%), India (23.8%), Thailand and the Philippines (both markets being up by 20.2%). “We also saw growth in the numbers of European visitors, despite the eurozone crisis. The number of British tourists showed the highest increase with a 15.8 percent rise and Germans at 14.2 percent,” added Mrs. Pangestu.

Among the factors of growth are world-class music concerts with the International Jazz Festival but also the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) meetings.

Besides the hosting of international events, a major contributing factor to Indonesia’s popularity is the multiplication of air links. National flag carrier Garuda Indonesia increased for example its flight frequency to Taiwan, Japan and Australia. Indonesia AirAsia recently opened new flights to Makassar including new frequencies to Kuala Lumpur and Kota Kinabalu in Malaysia. It plans also to boost frequencies to Medan. Tiger Airways also announced to open new flights out of Singapore to Bandung and Yogyakarta in July and August. Early May, Lion Air CEO Rusdi Kirana announced that its new subsidiary Batik Air plans to fly out of Manado to Guagnzhou with onwards connections to Balikpapan and Bali. Flights are due to start during the third or fourth quarter of this year.

The office of statistics meanwhile indicated that star-rated hotel room occupancy in 23 provinces reached 52.2 percent in March, a decrease of 0.47 percent compared to the same month last year.

The government fixed a target of nine million tourists in 2013, up by 12.5 % over 2012 which experienced over eight million foreign arrivals.

Sourced: TravelDailyNews