TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Tourism Minister Arief Yahya claimed that the government had allocated 40 percent of the tourism promotion budget for digital marketing, higher than that in other countries.

Arief Explained that 70 percent of the budget in other countries would be spent on non-digital marketing tools.

"The other 30 percent [is allocated] for promotion on the Internet," Areif said in Jakarta on Friday, February 26, 2016.Due to the huge potential of Internet users today, Arief said that the budget allocation for digital promotion should be increased to 40 percent.

"Therefore, our digital tourism budget is higher than those in other countries," Arief added.

Arief admitted that non-digital promotion activities still dominated the budget allocation. However, Arief said that the non-digital promotion tools were no longer effective, since most travellers accessed the Internet to look for information on their destinations. Arief revealed that the government had planned to improve booking and payment services in order to boost the number of visitors.

In a bid to promote the Indonesian tourism, the ministry initiated cooperation with a number of tech companies to reach global market. Recently, the ministry worked with Chinese browser, Baidu, to increase the number of Chinese tourists visiting Indonesia.

MAWARDAH NUR HANIFIYANI