Why Indonesian golfers still get left behind

Why Indonesian golfers still get left behind

By Sri Wahyuni

JAKARTA (JP): Golf does not necessarily exclude the less-than
wealthy. Regardless that the market price of transferable
permanent membership at certain golf courses is very expensive --
some cost up to US$150,000 -- there is also a growing number of
talented and qualified golf players in Indonesia, both
professional and amateur, being of families that are not rich.

A lack of sponsorship is often a problem for these poor golf
players in moving on. Yet, there has always been a way to handle
it. Indonesian Golf Association (PGI) secretary-general Sjachrul
Taufik Aziz, 63, shares his experience with The Jakarta Post in
dealing with such a problem.

Question: How do you see the development of golf in Indonesia
compared to in other countries in the region?

Answer: The development of this sport is inseparable from
people's prosperity, especially when we talk about professional
golfers. That's why our professional golfers are far behind.

Indonesian amateur golfers, on the contrary, are much better.
I can say that they are comparable to those in the Philippines,
Thailand, Singapore and Myanmar, although they are not yet
comparable to those in Taiwan, Japan and Korea.

There are of course indications of growing development. As you
see, only eight to nine years ago, golf was not recognized as a
place for promising professions both as a sport and as a field of
(golf course) business management. This changed in the early
1990s following the growing development of golf courses all
across the country.

Nevertheless, it's saddening -- though understandable -- that
for the last five to six years of its growing development, almost
all of the top management levels in almost all club houses in
Indonesia are still under expatriates.

Q: Are you saying that we don't have many local golf course top
managers yet?

A: That's right. The percentage of local top managers is less
than 5 percent. The good news is golf is now seen as a place of
promising professions. Top managers of a club house in Jakarta,
for example, can earn a monthly take-home salary of between
US$5,000 and $6,000. It's interesting, isn't it?

I've noticed at least two Indonesian amateur golfers who
graduated from U.S. golf academies. One in San Diego, the other
from the California Golf Academy. Both are surely promising golf
course top managers to be. There are certainly many more to come,
including those who are not golf players.

Q: How long will it take for the locals to take over all the
expatriates' positions as top managers in Indonesian golf
courses?

A: I cannot say. It will take time but I'm quite sure that the
time will come. We have the potential to do so. It's only a
matter of time because it was only a few years ago that we
realized we could make a living by it.

Even as a golfer, if you are good enough, you can make a
living from it. If an Indonesian professional golfer of top level
wins, let's say, two tournaments in a year, he would earn Rp 50
million to Rp 100 million a year. It's a big enough sum for an
average Indonesian, isn't it?

If you are at a lower level, on the other hand, your earnings
will only be about Rp 5 million to Rp 6 million a year. It is
nothing compared to the expenses you have to pay to take part in
the tournaments. Can you imagine those who never win a
tournament?

Q: Is that a problem?

A: Of course. It makes it even more difficult to attract educated
young beginners to play golf. Not only they will earn nothing,
they will spend more money as well.

Q: How does PGI usually overcome such a problem?

A: As matter of fact, there are always rich people who donate to
poor golfers, without expecting any reward. Thanks to these
people, there is also a growing phenomenon of Indonesian
professional golf players from the grass roots. They usually come
from families which have a member -- mostly the father -- working
at a golf course or in golf course surroundings.

Q: Will this phenomenon help to eliminate the image that golf is
only for rich people?

A: We cannot deny that such an image is indeed there.
Nevertheless, we cannot deny either that most of our (Indonesian)
top-ranked amateur golfers are not from rich families.

Q: If that is the case, what is the most difficult obstacle the
PGI is facing in producing top national players at the present
time?

A: I myself never see it (obstacle) as a difficulty. A good
player will only grow well if the sport itself is growing well in
the country. It's, therefore, not just the training that counts.
How can we produce good players if the sport itself doesn't grow
well here?

Q: How do you see it here given the fact that the number of golf
courses is amazingly increasing?

A: Regardless of how expensive memberships or green fees are, the
increasing number of golf courses will eventually make it
possible for more newcomers to come. It will in turn give us more
opportunities to observe and select talented players, through the
tournaments we conduct, to be further trained in the national
training center.

We, for example, have found recently a talented female player
from Manado, North Sulawesi. Although she is old enough as a
beginner, she is 18 years of age, she is worthy regarding the
fact that we have only a very limited number of female players.
She is now one of the two Indonesian female players trained
abroad in preparation for the upcoming SEA Games.

Q: Golf courses have always been related to destruction. How do
you accept this?

A: Let me put it this way. A real estate site usually is built on
an area of 500 hectares to 600 ha or even 1,000 ha. An 18-hole
golf course will only occupy about 50 ha to 60 ha of that. How
can a golf course which occupies only one-tenth of the whole
site, or even less than that, be considered a cause of the
problem?

This is understandable, however, because golf courses are
usually built ahead of the other facilities including the housing
development. That's why it's almost always the golf course which
is the first target when a real estate development has trouble
with land disputes.