Jakarta (ANTARA) – Deputy Speaker of the People’s Consultative Assembly (MPR)Lestari Moerdijathas said that anticipating global trends in the tourism sector is crucial for the development of national tourism.To this end, stakeholders must tap into the tourism potential of regions to face current challenges, she said. “The change in global tourists’ behaviors must be studied and then responded with a number of efforts to encourage the various tourism potentials that we have to adapt to the trend,” she said in a written statement received here on Monday. The notes of the Ministry of Tourism and Creative Economy show that there has been a shift in global tourist behaviors, which has led to a new tourism trend, Moerdijat added. The new trend has emerged due to a shift in the work paradigm to one that prioritizes flexibility and stress relief, with tourists seeking mind-refreshing activities, thus wellness tourism must accordingly be encouraged, she explained. She said that tourists are seeking unique vacation experiences so they are looking up the attractions of each area they plan to visit. In choosing destinations, tourists are relying heavily on honest ratings and reviews from visitors. She noted that the change in trend must be anticipated with several adaptive measures so that the potential of national tourism to attract international tourists can become even bigger. Based on the records of Statistics Indonesia (BPS), the number of international tourist arrivals in Indonesia in the JanuaryMarch 2023 period reached 2.24 million, an increase of 508.87 percent compared to the same period the previous year. In the JanuaryMarch 2022 period, the number of international tourist arrivals stood at 369,180. Moerdijat expressed the hope that the adaptation efforts to respond to the change in global tourism trends would be carried out maximally, in line with efforts to preserve culture in a number of tourist destinations in the country. The MPR deputy speaker highlighted that efforts to preserve local culture can greatly help in the creation of unique tourism experiences that foreign tourists seek. The developing tourism trend must be responded to with the right steps so that it can bring benefits to national tourism and support cultural preservation, she remarked.

Source: Antara News Agency