TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Indonesia is recently ranked second world`s halal tourism in the 2018 Global Muslim Travel Index (GMTI). GMTI was released by Muslim tourism research institution Crescent Rating.

This has improved Indonesia’s position to one level higher when compared to the previous year. Indonesian Tourism Minister Arief Yahya is optimistic that the country will place first in the 2019 GMTI.

“Indonesia will rank first in the 2019 GMTI,” said Arief. Indonesia’s second spot is shared with the United Arab Emirates. Meanwhile, the first spot is taken by Malaysia that has ranked first for eight consecutive years.

Read: Developing Lake Toba as Halal Tourism Destination

Indonesia’s rank in the world halal tourism is considered as a priority considering that it will be able to help Indonesia meet its target of attracting 20 million visitors by 2019.

“Our target is Indonesia will be visited by five million Muslim tourists and spark the activities of 242 million domestic tourists throughout 2019,” said Tourism Minister.

According to the GMTI report, the world’s Muslim tourism continues to grow rapidly which is evident through the data in the year 2000 where there were 25 million worldwide Muslim tourists. Meanwhile, that number has been jacked up to 131 million Muslim tourists in 2018. It is expected to rise to 220 million by the year 2020.

Francisca Christy Rosana