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Saturday night’s Miss Indonesian Tourism 2009 grand final was a much-needed respite to the weeklong political drama involving the nation’s perennial issue of corruption in high places.

The event also reminded us of the tough challenges the tourism sector faces now and in the future: a recent World Economic Forum-sponsored report ranked Indonesia 81st out of 133 countries in terms of competitiveness.

Despite what seem to be the best efforts of the nation’s tourism players, we managed to rise only one rung on the ladder compared to last year’s report.

Among our neighbors, Singapore (10), Malaysia (32), Thailand (39) and Brunei (69) fared much better. But if it is any consolation, we bested the Philippines (86), Vietnam (89) and Cambodia (108).

Clearly, something is amiss here, but this has not prevented tourism officials from setting a target of seven million foreign tourists visiting Indonesia next year.

That is a modest increase of 500,000 over this year’s target of 6.5 million foreign tourist arrivals.

As a country that has everything that tourists usually find desirable — natural beauty, exotic culture, comfortable facilities and friendly people — Indonesia deserves to be visited by more than seven million foreigners a year.

By comparison, Malaysia, which in many ways comes close to what Indonesia has to offer, last year managed to attract 21 million foreign tourists — three times as many as what Indonesia looks forward to seeing next year.

Malaysia’s aggressive and imaginative promotion schemes have paid off handsomely; their officials seem to have touched the right nerve in foreigners and have enticed them to the country in droves.

A business principle says that if you believe you have a good product at a reasonable price but it doesn’t sell as well as it should, there must be something wrong with the marketing plan. Or, we might have the right game plan but the wrong kind of people tasked to execute it.

The situation becomes worse if you think you have the right plan as well as the right kind of people behind it, though in truth you have neither.

Compounding the problem is the smug attitude in thinking you have such a good product that it hardly needs to be promoted. The official annual budget to promote Indonesia’s tourism sector is a mere $15 million. That sum roughly amounts to what provinces spend in a year on banners and traditional dances to welcome officials from Jakarta to officiate government projects in the regions.

In a perfect world, if $15 million brings in a little more than six million foreign tourists in a year, doubling the promotion budget should translate into more than 12 million overseas visitors.

But we don’t live in a perfect world, so more creative methods are needed to realize our full tourism potential. The key is having the magnanimity to acknowledge that the current plan does not work. Some deep soul-searching is called for to review the entire game plan, including high-level lobbying with related ministers and legislators.

Tourism is not a standalone sector but, as many experts have pointed out, one that requires an integrated approach involving other ministries.

Malaysia’s success in attracting 21 million foreign tourists a year may be a tough act for our tourism officials and players to follow, but bringing in a mere 6.5 million foreign tourists in the same period borders on the ridiculous.

In the past we had Telecommunications and Tourism Minister Joop Ave and his wealth of imagination, which put Indonesia on the world’s tourism map. The former career diplomat is credited with having spearheaded the development of Bali’s tourism enclave, Nusa Dua, making the island what it is today: one of the most favored destinations in the world.

Not surprisingly, several Asean countries, Thailand in particular, have sought Ave’s advice.

Many observers have already commented that the much-awaited development of Lombok Island into a tourist destination, mired in bureaucracy and political impasses, would have long ago become a reality were Ave in charge of it.

These other Asean countries have creatively adopted the Deng Xiaoping Principle on deploying cats to catch rats: It doesn’t really matter if the person at the helm is a fellow countryman, as long as he can help them develop their tourism potential.

The point is clear: Officials have to realize that tourism is too important to be left only to their unworkable politically driven instincts and personal whims.



Taufik Darusman is a veteran Jakarta-based journalist.