(8/17/2014)
The chair of the Indonesian Tourism Promotion Board (BPPI) is calling for a revolution in thinking in order to advance to make Indonesian tourism internationally competitive.
The BPPI chairwoman, Yanti Sukamdani, quoted in travel.detik.com, said Indonesia needs a twin revolution – a mental revolution and a tourism revolution. Sukamdani was at a luncheon discussing the concept of a quantum Leap for Tourism and the Creative Economy hosted by the BPPI in Jakarta on Wednesday, August 13, 2014.
According to Yanti, the mental revolution needed calls for battling corruption in order to prevent the loss of State funds that will, in turn, help accelerate the rate of national development.
Continuing, she said the public’s welfare and morality must be enhanced, saying, “Indonesia must have its own identity.”
“Indonesia is indeed famed for the friendliness of its people, but in times like these that alone is not enough,” warned the BPPI chair.
Referring to what she sees as a necessary revolution in tourism, Yanti called for higher tourism targets of 20-25 million foreign visitors and 275 domestic tourism trips by 2019.
In order to achieve these ambitious tourism targets, Yanti said significant improvements must be made in the national infrastructure. In addition, immigration processing must be facilitated for the comfort of foreign visitors. This should also include increasing the number of countries granting visas-on-arrival.
“How can it be that tourists wanting to holiday in Indonesia must line up for long periods of time at immigration? We need to fix this,” Yanti insists.
Commenting further on the needed tourism revolution, the BPPI chairwoman said the industry needs qualified professionals holding certification in their field of competency.
Finally, Sukamdani underlined the need for security in order to foster tourism growth in Indonesia.
Only through a revolution in mentality and Indonesia’s approach to tourism can National tourism development goals be realized.
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