These ten designated tourist centers (see table below) are selected by the Indonesian government as they are considered to have considerable growth potential. The government will organize international events and engage in advertisement campaigns to promote these ten destinations. Indonesian Tourism Minister Arief Yahya said these destinations should support foreign visitor arrivals to reach 12 million in 2016. However, the minister added that infrastructure needs to be improved in and around these locations.

Ten Designated Tourist Centers:

Destination Province
Morotai North Moluccas
Mandalika West Nusa Tenggara
Tanjung Lesung Banten
Labuan Bajo East Nusa Tenggara
Borobudur Central Java
Wakatobi Southeast Sulawesi
Tanjung Kelayang Bangka Belitung Islands
Toba Lake North Sumatra
Thousand Islands DKI Jakarta
Bromo-Tengger-Semeru East Java

Three institutions - Indef, Kenta Institute and the Indonesia Tourism Industry Board (GIPI) - claim that Indonesia should be able to attract 33 million foreign visitors by 2019 as the country offers more to the tourist market than any other ASEAN member country, including Thailand and Malaysia. Indonesia is much larger, has more tourist objects, a more diverse cultural composition, plenty of historic and religious remnants, and beautiful and a wide variety of natural scenery.

Read: Overview of Indonesia's Tourism Industry

However, in order to attract 33 million foreign tourists by 2019, these three institutions say at least three requirements have to be met. Firstly, the government has to enhance intra- and inter island connectivity around the ten designated tourist centers. For example, runways have to be extended as they are currently too short to serve larger airplanes. Moreover, operation hours of these local airports have to be extended as they currently close at 17:00 pm. Secondly, passenger and cargo terminals (sea transportation) have to be built separately. Thirdly, there should be direct international flights from and to these ten designated tourist centers (implying there have to be immigration services as well).

Eric Alexander Sugandi, analyst at the Kenta Institute, stated that apart from improving infrastructure, local services and skills also need to be improved in order to satisfy foreign tourists. For example, hotel management, skills of hotel staff and guides (including foreign language skills), as well as taxi services.

Foreign Tourist Arrivals in Indonesia, 2013-2015:

Month  Tourist Arrivals
         2013
 Tourist Arrivals
         2014
 Tourist Arrivals
         2015
January        614,328        753,079        723,039
February        678,415        702,666        786,653
March        725,316        765,607        789,596
April        646,117        726,332        749,882
May        700,708        752,363        793,499
June        789,594        851,475        815,148
July        717,784        777,210        814,233
August        771,009        826,821        850,542
September        770,878        791,296        869,179
October        719,900        808,767        825,818
November        807,422        764,461
December        766,966        915,334
Total       8,802,129       9,435,411       8,017,589


Foreign Tourist Arrivals in Indonesia, 2007-2015:

    2008   2009   2010   2011   2012   2013   2014  2015  2016
Foreign Tourists
(in millions)
  6.23   6.32   7.00   7.65   8.04   8.80   9.44  10.0¹  12.0¹
Foreign Exchange
Earnings
(in billion USD)
   n.a.   6.30   7.60   8.55   9.12   10.1   10.7  12.1

¹ indicates government target
Source: Statistics Indonesia (BPS)

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