Total international visitor arrivals to Indonesia in February reached a record high for the month for the past 10 years, rising 11.95% compared to February 2014 making a total 768,653 for the month. The total international visitors in the first 2 months of 2015 counted as 1.5 Million, up 4% compared to the same period year on year.
The surge in the number of tourists to Indonesia in February was due to the Chinese New Year holidays and increased Garuda Indonesia regular and charter flights from many cities on mainland China. Chinese New Year Celebrations were held across Indonesia especially the Cap Go Meh celebrations in Singkawang West Kalimantan, and in Yogya, Semarang, Bandung and other cities.
Top markets in the January and February period were China with 218,023 tourists, followed by Singapore at 201,585, Malaysia at 175,540, Australia at 169,318 and Japan at 82,666 tourists. These top five markets constituted 60 percent of total foreign visitor arrivals to Indonesia.
While, highest increase by destination was experienced in Bali, surging 13,46% compared to the same two months last year, visitors to Batam increased by 8.14% while overseas visitors who came through Jakarta’s Soekarno-Hatta International Airport actually declined by -8.44%
Minister of Tourism, Arief Yahya is confident that since 30 more countries are to be given visa free facilities, Indonesia can this year expect to receive between 10 million to 12 million visitors, providing an expected receipt of US$ 12 billion to the country.
