Garuda eyes Shanghai for boost after Bali

A'an Suryana, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

National carrier Garuda Indonesia opened a Jakarta-Shanghai route last week, with hopes the lucrative Chinese market will offset a plunge in passenger numbers from Australia and Europe following last month's deadly blasts in Bali.

Garuda began serving the twice weekly Shanghai route last Monday. The flight, with a stopover in Singapore, takes about 7.5 hours.

"China is a lucrative market," Garuda's vice president for marketing and development, Irman Imawan, said in Jakarta on Friday.

According to the Civil Aviation Authority of China, on average some 300,000 people fly from China to Indonesia every year. Indonesia ranks among the top destinations in Southeast Asia for Chinese travelers, it said.

Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Singapore and Seoul attract some 4.6 million travelers from China every year.

"About 105,600 passengers fly from Shanghai to Jakarta," Irman said without disclosing over what period these numbers came from.

He said that given Shanghai's rise as an economic center in China, he was confident the number of passengers would grow.

Shanghai is a fast growing industrial city with a population of 16.7 million. With an economic growth that is outpacing the rest of China, the city's population enjoys an average annual income of US$4,162, compared to $909 elsewhere in China.

The number of people flying between Jakarta and Shanghai is larger than from China to Indonesia in total, Irman added.

Such positive ties between the two countries are something of a recent phenomenon, after years of strained relations. After an abortive coup blamed on the Indonesian Communist Party in the mid-60s, the relationship between Jakarta and Beijing was severed, and diplomatic ties were not restored until 1992.

In the past, the Chinese have been somewhat reluctant to visit Indonesia due in part to reports of discrimination against them, especially after the 1998 May riots in Jakarta.

Yet the real obstacle to Garuda tapping the full potential of its new route may be a matter of mere convenience, since a visa to Indonesia cannot be obtained in Shanghai.

Currently, Chinese must travel to Beijing to apply for a visa. However, Indonesia has plans to open a consulate in Shanghai.

The Shanghai route is Garuda's third route to China. It also flies three times a week to Guangzhou and seven times a week to Hong Kong.

The airline's 293-seat Airbus A-330 will serve the flight to Shanghai from Jakarta every Monday and Wednesday, with return flights the following day.

"From the first two flights, the passenger load factor was already at 95 percent from Jakarta to Shanghai and 13 percent on the return flights," said Garuda's general manager for Hong Kong, Wandy Hady.

Shanghai could help Garuda offset the impact of the Bali attack, which has harmed revenue from the airline's European and Australian routes.

The national carrier said last month it would reduce its flights to Australia, the United Kingdom, Japan and South Korea, and stop flights to the cities of Frankfurt in Germany, Fukuoka in Japan and Adelaide in Australia.