RI, Singapore to set up tourist promotion body

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)