Tourist promotion body plans to hold Travel Mart in April

JAKARTA (JP): The Indonesian Tourist Promotion Board (BPPI) and the Indonesian chapter of the Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA) will hold the second Nusantara Travel Mart 2001 in April next year to further encourage domestic tourism.

Chairwoman of the travel mart, and chief of PATA Indonesia, Elly Hutabarat, said on Monday that the success of this year's travel mart had induced BPPI and PATA to make it an annual event.

The Nusantara Travel Mart, unlike the Indonesia Tourism Mart and Expo 2000 (TIME), targets domestic tourists instead of foreign tourists, she said.

The Nusantara Travel Mart also targets the consumers directly, Elly said.

"Our target visitors include the general public, companies that usually give holiday incentives to their employees, professional associations, government institutions, and students of tourism academies," she said.

The mart will feature domestic destinations and tourist packages especially designed for domestic tourists, Elly explained.

She said that the difficulties of attracting foreign visitors to the country had forced the industry to look to the domestic market for their livelihood.

"Of course domestic tourism would not contribute anything in terms of foreign exchange, but its trickle-down effect is actually much greater than foreign tourists," Elly said, explaining that domestic tourists would provide greater benefit to the local food and beverages vendors than foreigners who usually have restrictions.

She said that this year's travel mart, held in May, had attracted the participation of 101 companies and had generated approximately Rp 5.5 billion (US$578,947) worth of transactions.

"The mart also attracted more than 20,000 visitors," Elly said in a media conference.

The Nusantara Travel Mart 2001, to be held at the Jakarta Convention Center, is scheduled for April 6 until April 9.

"Experience from this year's travel mart was that buyers kept coming long after the mart was over. We want to give holiday -goers enough time to prepare their holidays," Elly explained that the time frame was two months away from the national school holidays.

The mart is expected to attract at least 250 companies to participate, and generate transactions worth more than Rp 7.5 billion, Elly said.

One of the sponsors of the Rp 1.5 billion event is Indonesian flag carrier PT Garuda Indonesia who will be giving discounted tickets to participants.

Garuda vice president of marketing, planning and development Marco Umbas said that the airline will also be giving discounts at the mart, but that the amount has not been decided on. (tnt)