RI targets Chinese tourists

RI targets Chinese tourists

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The Indonesian government is casting an appreciative eye toward
the increasing number of Chinese traveling overseas for vacation,
and hopes to lure some 240,000 Chinese tourists to Indonesia's
shores in 2005.

"We plan to quadruple the number of Chinese tourists visiting
Indonesia," State Minister for Culture and Tourism Jero Wacik
said on Tuesday.

Jero said the number of outbound tourists from China, the
world's most populous country, reached about 20 million last
year, but Indonesia was only able to attract some 80,000 of these
tourists.

To improve on this figure, Jero said the government had
recently opened immigration offices in its consulates in Shanghai
and Ghuangzhou, in addition to the immigration office in the
Indonesian Embassy in Beijing.

The government also hopes to cooperate with Singapore, which
last year received 700,000 Chinese tourists, to bring in more
Chinese tourists to the region.

"We hope that when Chinese tourists are done sight-seeing and
shopping in Singapore, they will be interested in continuing on
to Indonesia, which has hundreds of tourist attractions for them
to visit," Jero said.

Concerning plans to attract more tourists from the Middle East
and India, Jero said the government was considering revising its
visa-on-arrival (VOA) policy, by increasing the visas from three
days to seven days and from 30 days to 60 days. The fees for the
visas may also be reduced from US$35 to $25.

"We have proposed 16 more countries be given the VOA facility,
from the current 21 countries," he said.

The government hopes to attract six million foreign tourists
this year, who are expected to bring in $6 billion in foreign
exchange revenue.

Last year, Indonesia attracted some 5.3 million foreign
tourists who brought in some $5.3 billion in foreign exchange
revenue.

The Central Statistics Agency (BPS) reported on Tuesday that
foreign tourist arrivals dropped slightly to 348,600 in January
2005 from 416,500 in December 2004.

Commenting on the BPS report, Jero said it was normal to see a
drop in tourist arrivals after the December high season.