At the Solo Menari event held here on Monday, the ministry's Director of Domestic Tourism Marketing, Dwi Marhen Yono, lauded the Surakarta city government and all partners that expended their energy to Solo Menari.
"This confirms Solo, which is the only city in Indonesia that is a UNESCO Creative City," he remarked.
He said that the latest research found 10.6 million foreign tourists had come to Indonesia in 2023.
Meanwhile, the number of foreign tourists to Indonesia is targeted to increase to 14.3 million this year.
Yono said the research also found that foreign tourists no longer came to Indonesia to only witness the beauty of the oceans but for other reasons, such as the culture and food.
"They want to enjoy typical Indonesian culinary specialties, while the second is to enjoy the unique cultural arts of the archipelago, and the third is because they attend events, and Solo is now the best eventful city in Indonesia," he stated.
Related news: Minister eager for Solo to become MICE leading destination
Meanwhile, he acknowledged that it was no easy task to achieve the target of bringing in 14.3 million foreign tourists, with expected total foreign exchange of Rp60 trillion, or around US$3.6 billion.
"Apart from that, we have a target of 1.25 billion-1.5 billion domestic tourist movements. With each of the one billion people spending around Rp2 million, there will be Rp2,000 trillion of money rotating in the tourism and creative economy sectors," he highlighted.
He said that tourists spent on souvenirs, transportation, tour packages, food, accommodation, and other needs in travel.
Related news: Uno targets Batam, Medan, Solo, and Surabaya for shopping tourism
Translator: Aris W, Kenzu
Editor: Yuni Arisandy Sinaga
Copyright © ANTARA 2024
