Jeju Island gears up to host next PATA meeting

The Jakarta Post, Nusa Dua, Bali

Although the next Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA) conference is still a year away, the host, South Korea's Jeju Island, has been gearing up to promote the event among the prospective participants gathered in Bali this year.

Kee Min, South Korea's delegation head to the 52nd PATA conference in Nusa Dua, told reporters on Wednesday that he had brought along with him 39 South Korean delegates, ranging from public officials, hoteliers and immigration and customs officers to promote the event and learn how the conference should be organized.

"We want to lean how Bali has prepared and proceeds with the conference. But we want to produce a better one than this conference," he said.

Kee Min said the Jeju Provincial government had set aside US$500,000 for promotion purposes alone.

"We want to market Jeju through having a big conference, inviting the media and putting commercials on television," Kee Min said.

Jeju Island is the largest and one of the most popular resort islands in South Korea. It is located 60 miles (around 90 kilometers) from the southern mainland coast.

The island is home to 550,000 people, occupying an area of 700 square miles.

Like Bali, the island attracts many tourists, more than 4.5 million tourists a year, 10 percent of them non-Korean.

Kee Min said the island would take advantage of the PATA conference next year to attract more foreign tourists to the island.

For the conference, the island has prepared four five-star hotels and hundreds of non-star accommodations. It has also built a convention center that can take up to 4,300 people.