RI, Singapore to set up tourist promotion body
JAKARTA (JP): Indonesia and Singapore agreed yesterday to set up a joint marketing group, consisting of businessmen and government officials, to identify tourism trends, potential markets for tourist promotion and product development.
Coordinating Minister for Industry and Trade Hartarto and Singaporean Deputy Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong reached the agreement during a one-day ministerial committee meeting on Indonesia-Singapore tourism cooperation held here.
Hartarto, who was accompanied by Minister of Transportation Haryanto Dhanutirto, Minister of Public Works Radinal Moochtar and Minister of Tourism, Post and Telecommunications Joop Ave, said the committee was expected to boost the participation of the private sector in the tourism business.
He said that, on the Indonesian side, businessman Pontjo Sutowo had been chosen to head the committee's private sector group, while other committee members from the government sector had been selected by the ministries of tourism, post and telecommunications; public works; and transportation.
"The increasing number of tourists visiting Indonesia will provide the private sectors of both countries with an opportunity to jointly develop infrastructure and supporting facilities," Hartarto said.
The cooperation between Indonesia and Singapore, he said, would result in a "win-win situation", with Indonesia benefiting from its tourist attraction potential and Singapore from its highly developed tourism industry and capital resources.
Lee, who was accompanied by Singaporean Minister for Trade and Industry Yeo Cheow Tong and Minister for Communications Mah Bow Tan, said that the business sectors of both countries would be encouraged to take part in developing infrastructure and tourism development projects in Indonesia.
The private sector, he said, could study the available infrastructure projects to determine whether or not they were feasible and to explore the possibility of joint ventures.
"If they are not feasible but they are desirable, because they have indirect benefits which are necessary for the overall success of the tourism project, then we will have to see by some kind of creative packaging, or have a way to restructure the projects so that commercially they are viable and bankable," he said.
Hartarto said yesterday's meeting also discussed joint projects with Singapore, such as the upgrading of the Adi Sumarmo airport in Surakarta (Solo) in Central Java, the Sam Ratulangi airport in Manado, North Sulawesi, the construction of a new airport and tourist resorts in Lombok, West Nusa Tenggara, and in West Sumatra, as well as the construction of a Yogyakarta- Surakarta-Semarang toll road to enhance tourist access to the region.
Yesterday's conference was a follow-up of a summit meeting between President Soeharto and Singaporean Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong last September in Yogyakarta, during which the two heads of government agreed to boost cooperation in air transport, tourism and other sectors.
Hartarto said yesterday that in addition to direct flights between Singapore and Manado, Padang (West Sumatra), Lombok and Surakarta -- served by Singapore's SilkAir in collaboration with Indonesia's Sempati and Merpati airlines -- a direct link between Singapore and Ujungpandang in South Sulawesi is to be established in October.
He said the possibility of direct flights between Singapore and Bandung, West Java, was currently being studied.
Hartarto said that cooperative tourism efforts between the two countries had been commenced in 1990, in which an agreement was signed regarding development cooperation in Riau province, which includes the islands of Batam and Bintan.
The number of tourist arrivals in Indonesia last year reached four million. Between January and April this year tourist arrivals had already reached 1,087,342, reflecting an 8.13 percent increase from the corresponding period of last year.
The most significant increase took place in Manado, where arrivals rose by 76.43 percent.
The tourism sector is expected to become Indonesia's biggest foreign exchange earning sector by the end of the sixth five-year development plan period in 2004. In that year 10 million tourists are expected to visit the country.
According to the World Travel and Tourism Council, the tourism industry currently contributes US$3.4 trillion to global gross domestic product and that figure is expected to increase by more than 50 percent in real terms within the next decade.
The tourist industry accounts for 10 percent of Asia-Pacific region's gross domestic product, amounting to $804 billion and generating more than 130 million jobs. (pwn)