THE Indonesian Hotel and Restaurant Association is urging the government to review its order for all official meetings to be held in offices rather than hotels.
The move hurts hotels especially in regions where government meetings contribute 40-50 per cent of business.
Yanti Sukamdani, association chairman, said: “Hotel business is an agent of economic development in a region. Hotel and restaurant sectors contributed up to Rp50 trillion (US$4.2 billion) of tax revenue in 2012, the second biggest source after oil and gas.
“The government has set a high target of 20 million international arrivals and 75 million domestic travellers. One of the sectors that will contribute to this is MICE.”
As part of efforts to trim the state budget, Indonesian president Joko Widodo (Jokowi) instructed government officials to hold meetings on their own premises instead of hotels.
Hariyadi Sukamdani, IHRA vice chairman, said that while the new regulation creates the impression that hotel meetings are wasted expenditure, this was not necessarily the case. “Out-of-town participants still need to stay in a hotel and need transport to travel to and from the government offices. Is it really (cost- and time-) efficient?
Meanwhile Indonesia’s vice president, Jusuf Kalla, last week reiterated the need to cut unnecessary expenses and maximise existing assets in organising meetings. “A meeting with 100 participants does not need to take place in a conference hall or a hotel,” he said.
However, he commented: “Of course, if the meeting is big, for example, the minister of internal affairs is conducting a meeting with governors, mayors and regency heads from around the country for 1,000 people, and the office does not have a venue to fit, then they can hold the meeting outside the office.”
