by Abu Hanifah
JAKARTA, 24 (Xinhua) -- Indonesian central and regional governments are taking steps to promote further marine destinations in eastern region of Wakatobi and Morotai, aimed at vibrating tourism that would eventually give direct positive economy impacts to people around the destinations.
The steps were manifested in year-long tourism events in the eastern destinations which are best known for their breathtaking undersea coral, biodiversity views and small tropical isles with pristine beaches.
Wakatobi and Morotai are part of Indonesia's now-developed 10 new tour destinations, highly expected to spur the nation's economy from tourism sector which has been set core industry by the government.
Hosting the launch of tourism event calendar in Wakatobi here, Southeast Sulawesi Governor Nur Alam said that the year-long events would comprise festivals to further promote the beauty of Wakatobi Island to the world.
"Wakatobi has been set as the nation's development model for small islands and lagged region through tourism," the governor said recently.
The festivals would highlight marine and local cultural attractions, to be peaked by the ninth national-scale event of Wakatobi Wonderful Sail slated on August 10 to 13.
Wakatobi, that has marine resort and offers undersea beautiful scenery, is a frequent stop for foreign cruise ships during their sail in Indonesian waters.
The governor expected that the series of festivals in Wakatobi would further lure domestic and foreign visitors which this year targeted at 40,000.
The province itself has welcomed a total of 22,380 domestic and foreign visitors last year, or 19.5 percent higher than a year earlier.
Meanwhile for its destination near Pacific Ocean of Morotai, Indonesia has prepared a six-month festival that comprise of marine-related competitions for the visitors.
Addressing the launch of the events called 2017 Wonderful Morotai Island Festival (WMIF), Indonesian Tourism Minister Arief Yahya said massive promotion needs to be taken to promote the far-flung destination to make it a world class one.
"The events were expected to lure 135,000 foreign and 540,000 domestic visitors to come there this year," the minister said over the weekend to address the event slated from May to October this year.
Among competitions featured in the 2017 WMIF were photo contest and fishing at open sea which attract many foreign and domestic enthusiasts.
The destination located in North Maluku province is famous for its beautiful and undersea coral scenery featured with wrecks of World War II battle ships which are many in Morotai seabed.
The minister added that the government has planned to expand the capacity of airstrip serving in Morotai so as to provide international access to the destination which is close to the Philippines, Japan, South Korea, China and several Pacific island countries.
An Indonesian private developer firm, Jababeka, revealed recently that it has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) document with an Asian investor partner to develop hospitality accommodation in Morotai.
In the MoU document, Jababeka Chairman Darmono said that his firm's partner was willing to develop hotels and villas in Morotai with total rooms of up to 300.
Without disclosing his investor partner, Darmono said on Sunday that the initial investment to begin the project was 100 million U.S. dollars and could be expanded to 1 billion U.S. dollars in the future.
