Retreat islands in Singapore's backyard

Retreat islands in Singapore's backyard

Fadli
Contributor
Batam

The hotel business, including the resort hotels on Batam and
the nearby island of Bintan, has been booming in the past three
years despite a setback in the hotel industry in the other parts
of the country.

While many hotels are struggling to survive amid the downfall
in the number of foreign tourists, the hotel industry on the two
islands is doing quite well.

Batam, according to the local tourism office, has 43 star-
rated hotels to date, including three resort hotels, while
Bintan, the newly developed tourist resort nearby, has seven
modern resort hotels.

The Sept. 11 terrorist against the United States caused a
growing concern over the safety of traveling, dealing a major
blow to most Indonesian tourist destinations.

But the two islands, which are only about a 45-minute trip by
ferry from Singapore, are almost immune to such security fears as
evidenced by the continued increase in the number of tourists.
For Singaporeans and other members of the Association of South
East Asian Nations (ASEAN), the two islands have become popular
retreat destinations.

Although many executives of the local tourism-related
companies complain that the two islands still lack promotion, the
number of foreign tourists continues to increase from year to
year.

Last year, the number of foreign tourist arrivals reached 1.2
million, more than 20 percent of the total foreign tourist
arrivals to Indonesia -- 5.15 million -- in the same year. Of the
1.2 million foreign tourists visiting Batam and Bintan, 60
percent came from Singapore.

There are now three resort hotels on Batam, the country's
largest industrial bonded zone. The resort hotels, Batam View
Beach Resort, Turi Beach Resort and Pura Jaya, have specialized
their operations to cater to tourists.

Besides offering rooms and services of international
standards, they also have recreation facilities such as jet
skiing, wind surfing, water skiing, canoeing and fishing readily
available.

"Batam View Beach also provides a sightseeing tour that we
call the Kampong Tour. This facility is provided to guests who
want to take a look at traditional villages near the island's
coastal areas," the resort hotel's general manager Svein
Moldskred told The Jakarta Post.

According to him such a tour package is quite popular among
foreign tourists from Singapore, Korea, Japan and the United
States.

The resort hotels in Batam offer room rates of between Rp
400,000 (about US$45) to Rp 1 million per night for foreign
tourists. Indonesian visitors usually receive a special room
rate.

The Chairman of the Batam Authority, Ismeth Abdullah, said
that although Batam focuses on the development of industrial
facilities, the tourism industry will be further promoted to take
advantage of the growing tourist arrivals from neighboring
Singapore.

Ismeth said that Batam has many attractive locations to visit
such as the nearby Vietnamese refugee camp, the Buddhist temple
Maha Viara Duta Maitreya, and a number of beautiful isles
surrounding Batam and Bintan islands.

"The development of new tourism facilities or renovation of
the existing ones is one of our important programs," Ismeth said.

Unlike Batam, Bintan island has been solely developed into a
retreat destination. Developed as tourist destination by the
Indonesian government in the early 1990s in cooperation with the
Singaporean government, the island has become an important
tourist resort for Asian tourists.

Seven resort hotels with international standards have been
built in Lagoi, a tourist complex covering 23,000 hectares in the
coastal area of the island. They include Banyan Tree, Angsana,
Nirwana Garden, Club Med, Bintan Lagun, Sedona and Mayang Sari,

The relatively new tourist destination, which is located away
from local communities, is quite suitable for holiday makers. But
executives of the hotels in the area said that the place had not
yet been as popular as other tourist destinations in the country
despite the high quality of services and facilities offered by
the hotels.

"Although we have facilities with international standards, the
business is not as good as expected," Trizno Tarmoezi, the
director of human resources and corporate affairs of Banyan Tree,
told The Post.

With the beauty of the natural forests and beaches surrounding
it, the resort should have attracted more tourists, he said. "The
resort is not only beautiful but is also quite safe.
Unfortunately, due to the lack of promotion, not many people know
the place," he added.

Trizno said that most of tourists visiting the island were
Singaporeans who mostly came to the resort on weekends. "Only a
few Indonesians visit the area," he added.

The hotels, which offer room rates of between $200 to $300 per
night, also provide a special tour packages which include trips
to small isles nearby or to Tanjung Pinang town, about 70
kilometers away.

"The resort is especially good due to its safety and
comfortable accommodation facilities," he said. "In Bali tourists
are often disturbed with the presence of aggressive street
traders, but here in Bintan no one will disturb you," he added.

Like his colleagues in Batam, Trizno also complained that
Bintan island still lacked promotion. Most of the sales promotion
is done individually by the existing hotels and mostly through
the internet.

Robert Liar Lidrioux, the chairman of the tourism office of
the Riau islands regency, said that the Lagoi tourist complex had
not been fully developed.

"Only 10 percent of the 23,000 hectares appropriated for the
tourist facilities have been used.

The regency, which covers dozens of islands in Riau province
including Bintan, relies on the Lagoi tourist resort for its
future.

At present, the tourist facilities in Bintan contributes
between Rp 4 billion and Rp 5 billion to the regency's total
revenue.