Tourism Industry Outperforms National Economic Growth

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Indonesia's tourism industry seems to be immune to the global economic crisis. When the world economy collapsed, Indonesian tourism continues to grow, even surpassing the national economic growth.

Deputy Minister of Tourism and Creative Economy, Sapta Nirwandar, said that Indonesia's tourism growth in 2013 reached 9.39 percent, exceeding the national economic growth of 5.7 percent. Sapta said this while attending one of the largest tourism fairs in the world, the Internationale Torismus Börse, in Berlin, Germany.

"Our tourism sector was the fourth biggest contributor of foreign exchange in 2013," Sapta said in Berlin, Thursday, March 6, 2014.

He added that the tourism sector contributed Rp 347 trillion to the GDP, accounting for 23 percent of the total revenues targeted in the 2013 Amended State Budget of Rp 1,502 trillion.

Esthy Reko Astut, director general of marketing at the Ministry of Tourism and Creative Economy, said that this year Indonesia is targeting to attract 9.5 million foreign tourists. From January to November 2013 last year, 7.94 million foreign tourists visited the country, 9.12 percent higher when compared to the same period in 2012.

"The movement of local tourists also continued to increase, reaching 250 million people," he said on the same occasion.

The Central Statistics Agency's latest reports showed that the number of foreign tourists who travel to Indonesia in January 2014 reached 753,000 people, a 22.59 percent year-on-year increase.

"The highest increase occurred in the International Airport of Lombok, West Nusa Tenggara, which reached 374 percent," said BPS Deputy for Production Statistics, Adi Lumaksono, in a press statement.

Adi said that Indonesia's highest number of tourists come from Singapore (15.69 percent), followed by Malaysia (14.73), China (12.67), Australia (11.21), and Japan (4.62) .

S. MALELA MAHARGASARIE | ANGGA SUKMA WIJAYA