Tourism growing by leaps and bounds

Tourism growing by leaps and bounds

JAKARTA (JP): Tourism will likely replace textile products as
Indonesia's biggest foreign exchange earner outside oil and gas
by the end of the Sixth Five Year Development Plan (Repelita VI),
a senior official says.

"The rank of the tourism industry in foreign exchange earnings
among the non-oil sectors steadily increased from fifth in 1985
to third in 1992," Director General of Tourism Andi Mappi Sammeng
said after opening a workshop on competency-based framework for
tourism education and training here yesterday.

He said that in 1998, Indonesia expects some five to 6.5
million visitors, bringing in US$8.2 to $8.9 billion in foreign
exchange.

According to the Central Bureau of Statistics, Indonesia last
year gained $6.06 billion from textile exports and $5.47 billion
from timber exports. The Ministry of Tourism, Post and
Telecommunications said that the country gained $3.35 billion
from tourism.

Andi said yesterday that in 1985, the tourism industry, with
foreign exchange earnings of US$525 million, ranked fifth behind
timber at $1.19 billion, rubber with $726 million, textiles at
$559 million and coffee with $556 million.

The two-day workshop, aimed at getting input from Australia's
experience in the tourism industry, is being attended by 50
representatives from the Ministry of Tourism, Post and
Telecommunications, the Ministry of Culture and Education,
tourism schools and hotel and restaurant executives.

Andi said that to reach the target by the end of Repelita VI,
the tourism sector should increase its qualified human resources.

"For example, the number of visitors from Asian countries to
Indonesia is growing very fast, but we have few tour guides able
to speak Japanese, Korean and Mandarin Chinese," he said. (icn)