Tourist numbers down in April, BPS reports

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

With the advent of the low season, the number of foreign tourists arriving through Indonesia's 13 main entry points fell by almost 4 percent in April, after rising by more than 11 percent in March, the Central Statistics Agency (BPS) reported on Wednesday.

In its latest statistical survey of the country's tourism sector, the agency reported that 333,694 travellers had visited Indonesia in April, down from the 345,694 visitors recorded the previous month.

Given the latest figures, the country's tourism sector will have a lot of work to do before it can be said that this year has been a success, as the cumulative total of foreign tourists up to the end of April only stands at 1,337,310 visitors, down 1.41 percent from the 1,356,382 recorded in the same period last year.

The tourism ministry had targeted six million visitors from abroad for this year. Last year, 5.3 million foreign tourists traveled to the archipelago, generating some US$5.3 billion in foreign exchange.

Indonesia's tourism sector has been in the doldrums since the Bali terrorist bombings in 2002, and the bombing of the JW Marriott Hotel and the Australian Embassy in Jakarta in recent years.

At the same time, a series of SARS and bird flu epidemics in the region, as well as the recent Asian tsunami disaster late last year, only made things worse.

The problem has been exacerbated by the new visa regime, which requires tourists from many countries to obtain visas in their home countries before traveling to Indonesia. The permitted length of stay in Indonesia has also been reduced.

Nevertheless, tourism associations are still upbeat about Indonesia's tourism potential, saying the sector is on a recovery track and that Bali will be able to attract tourists diverting from neighboring countries affected by the disaster.

Indeed, the BPS reported that the resort island of Bali continued to be the archipelago's main tourist magnet, recording a slight increase in the number of visitors to 122,339 in April from 121,457 in March.

Tourist arrivals in North Sulawesi's Manado are also continuing to increase, with a 24.42 percent rise in foreign tourist arrivals in April. The province, popular for offshore snorkeling at the Bunaken islands, saw 1,353 visitors last month, up from 1,089 people in March.

All other main destinations in the country, including the capital Jakarta and the investment island Batam, saw a decline in their foreign visitors.

Similarly, both the average length of stays by foreign tourists and the occupancy rate in star-rated hotels in the country recorded declines.

The average length of stay of foreigner tourists in star-rated hotels in 10 tourist destinations throughout the country dropped to 2.05 days in March, as compared to 1.95 days in the same period the previous month.

The hotel occupancy rate, meanwhile, fell to an average of 44.51 percent, from 46.48 percent in February.