KUCHING, May 14: There will soon be an increase in flights serving the Malaysia-Indonesia route in response to the spike in the number of arrivals from Indonesia.
According to Malaysian Tourism, Arts and Culture Minister Dato Seri Tiong King Sing, the federal government will strive to open more routes and flight frequencies to meet the growing market demand.
He noted that Malaysia welcomed 247,889 and 222,923 visitors from Indonesia in January and February of this year, respectively, a significant increase compared to 1,714 and 1,756 arrivals respectively recorded in January and February last year.
In 2022, the total number of Indonesian tourist arrivals reached 1.48 million.
“As of April this year, Indonesia has reopened 12 entry points, with 482 weekly flights between Indonesia and Malaysia, totalling 83,276 seats.
“However, this is still only 70.2 per cent of the pre-pandemic period when there were 685 weekly flights in February 2020.
“As AirAsia is starting its twice-weekly Kertajati-Kuala Lumpur on May 17, it will also add the Jakarta-Kuching route flying three times weekly,” he said in a statement today.
Tiong further said as Malaysia is welcoming more visitors from Indonesia, it expects that the total number of arrivals would exceed the 1.48 million recorded last year, but the current number of flights cannot yet cope with this trend of increasing visitor volume.
In view of this, he has requested the Indonesian office of the Malaysian Tourism Board to ramp up engagement with the Indonesian government and their tourism counterparts to increase direct flights with Malaysian states to meet market demand.
“We are committed to increasing the number of flights between our two countries, especially during peak holidays. This would greatly stimulate our mutual tourism industry and promote economic development while building stronger links between our people.
“We will continue to cooperate closely with the Indonesian government to jointly promote tourism development for the benefit of the economy and people of Malaysia and Indonesia,” he emphasised. — DayakDaily
