Events involving foreigners canceled

JAKARTA: Many events involving foreign participants have been canceled, causing huge losses to the organizers, it was reported on Wednesday.

Director of Panorama Conventions and Exhibitions, Rocky Kalalo, told Antara that the events were canceled because the foreign participants could not make it.

He said that a delegation from India had canceled their participation in a tourism expo, scheduled for next month.

The news agency reported that some companies had moved the venues of their events from here to Singapore.

Noor Huda Ismail, assistant to marketing manager of Jakarta Convention Center (JCC) said the Indonesian Petroleum Association canceled their event which was slated for next month.

But it is business as usual for exhibitions focused on local consumers, such as computer and furniture exhibitions, he said.

Ismail said that JCC was not really affected by the cancellations because 80 percent of the events in the building targeted the local market.

As of September this year, there were 250 events held at JCC, compared to 347 for the same period last year. --JP