Heaptalk, Jakarta — Indonesia Tourism and Business Event Forum (ITBEF) 2022 has been organized for two days on August 15th – 16th, 2022, at Jakarta Convention Center (JCC). Implementing the Collaboration to Rise, as the conference theme, ITBEF aims to expand the participants’ knowledge, increase their networking, and create business opportunities in the tourism and MICE industry.
Marking the opening of this tourism and MICE conference, Indonesia’s Minister of Tourism and Creative Economy, Sandiaga Uno, affirmed that the MICE player has higher expenses than the leisure tourists, reaching by four to five times. Realizing this potential, Sandi claimed that the MICE sector could be one of the driving factors contributing to Indonesia’s foreign exchange.
“This action aligns with the national tourism strategy to prioritize quality tourism over quantity tourism. One of the most awaited and prestigious MICE events, the G20 Presidency, will be held in November 2022. This international-scale conference is expected to be a place for promoting Indonesia’s tourism and its outstanding products worldwide,” The Minister Sandi added.
The Ministry of tourism and professional associations will also actively bid on international MICE activities to be organized in Indonesia. According to the Travel and Tourism Development Index 2021, Indonesia has successfully raised its position to the 32nd level, significantly ascending from the 44th position in 2019. Also, based on ICCA report 2021, the archipelago reached the 9th position around the Asia-Pacific level, higher than the previous year at 10th rank in 2019 and the 4th rank in the ASEAN levels based upon the number of meetings.
Despite the challenges in regulations and policies, the limited flights to Indonesia from MICE target countries, and the metaverse trend, the Ministry expects this incredible accomplishment can boost the MICE stakeholder’s spirit to create innovation in carrying out more innovative MICE programs in the future.
Further, The Director of MICE at Indonesia’s Ministry of Tourism and Creative Economy, Iyung Masruroh, elaborated on the tourism industry’s contribution to the National’s GDP, which is predicted to gain 4.3% in 2022, higher than the 2021 expected achievement.
Moreover, the number of International tourists visiting Indonesia increased by 350,09% from January to April period in 2022, with the target number of international tourists to around 3.5 – 4.7 million from 15 primary markets: the UK, French, Germany, Netherlands, Rusia, UAE, Saudi Arabia, USA, Singapore, Malaysia, India, China, Japan, South Korea, and Australia.
The ICCA statistics report 2021 also recorded the number of international MICE visitors to Indonesia. The data shows Jakarta and Bali are still the most popular destinations for business or MICE, performing the outcome at 57.8% and 33.4%, increasing from February to October 2022.
As a part of the MICE Directorate’s actions to maintain this enhancement, Iyung affirmed her party would focus on several strategies: providing capacity building for MICE stakeholders, supporting the MICE players to hold international conferences in Indonesia, improving the national and global networking, and collaborating with MICE stakeholders to promotion and publication activity.
By adopting the technology as the new landscape of the MICE industry, the Chairwoman of ICCA Chapter Asia-Pacific, Jane Vong, claimed this new paradigm could support MICE players in expanding their brand globally. She also affirmed that technology utilization could easily capture the event data, including the pre-event, during-event, and post-event.
