Indonesian holidays a real bargain

Indonesian holidays a real bargain

CANBERRA, Australia (AP): Australian tourists have been flocking to Indonesia to take advantage of bargain rates produced by the Asian economic crisis.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics reported Tuesday that 323,500 visited Indonesia in the first 11 months of last year, an increase of 13 percent over the corresponding period in 1997.

Indonesia, especially the holiday island of Bali, is now the second most popular destination for Australian tourists traveling abroad.

Only its Pacific neighbor, New Zealand, attracted more Australian visitors, 414,300 in the first 11 months of last year. That represented an increase of 17 percent over the corresponding period of the previous year.

But the Asian economic crisis is still badly hurting Australia's domestic tourist industry. Japanese and other North East Asian visitors coming to Australia fell by 16 percent.

The number of Southeast Asian visitors that Australia received fell by 17 percent between the same periods.

The bureau also reported that these losses were only partly offset by increases in visitor numbers from other regions.

Australian tourism leaders Tuesday shrugged off a four percent slump in overseas visitor arrivals last year, expressing confidence an Asian recovery will boost growth from 2000 onwards.

ABS said 4.16 million short-term visitors came to the country in 1998, down from 4.32 million in 1997, equating to around A$645 million (US$406 million) in lost revenue

A major decline in Asian arrivals linked to the regional economic crisis was partly responsible, with tourists from Southeast Asia down 17 percent and Northeast Asia 16 percent.

The biggest falls were from Malaysia and Indonesia with Singapore the only Asian country to record an increase.