Indonesia to focus on MICE for tourism boost

“With its nature, marine and eco-tourism destinations as the country’s great assets, Indonesia can be a paradise for MICE tourists from all over the world,” said Ms Wiryanti Sukamdani, head of the Indonesian Tourism Promotion Board (BPPI).

Indonesia’s natural and cultural attractions would be the focus to boost tourism through Meeting, Incentive, Convention and Exhibition (MICE) opportunities as the tourism industry aimed for the country to make use of its assets to become a preferred destination for the world’s MICE tourists.She added that Indonesia’s MICE potential was all the more powerful due to the way it constantly pulled in foreign tourists. According to BPPI data from 2013, MICE tourism contributed 40 per cent to the total number of foreign tourists that year.

“We personally hope that the number of foreign tourists in 2019 can reach 20-25 million and 275 million for national tourists,” Wiryanti said. “That number can be reached by pushing forward the work performance of the MICE sector.”

The ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) is an opportunity for all the Southeast Asian nations to compete in a free-market setting. It will officially take effect in December 2015.

However, there are still plenty of issues along the road that may hamper progress leading to AEC 2015.

MICE players are also worried about the new government policy that limits meetings in hotels as a way of reducing the state budget. The government is one of their biggest markets.

“The potential of Indonesia’s MICE destinations had already been established in 16 Indonesian MICE cities, on the basis of nine criteria from 67 different indicators. Then came this policy,” said Achyaruddin, director of tourism development for Special Interests, Conventions, Incentives and Events at the Tourism Ministry.