TokyoTomo Travel Guide

Garuda Indonesia-Japan launched a project for visitor arrivals from Indonesia. Currently, Japanese nationals account for some 90 percent of the passengers carried by Garuda (GA) on its Japan routes. Depending on the day of the week, however, its seat load factor drops due to an insufficient number of Japanese groups booked. The airline strives to generate traffic originating from both countries in an effort to improve the overall seat load factor, ensuring a stable capacity offer with a possible demand-driven capacity increase in the foreseeable future. With the inbound travel project launched this time, Garuda aims to achieve an overall seat load factor of over 70 percent on the Japan routes and, on its strategically-selected Chubu route, it strives to transport some 160 visitor arrivals monthly from Indonesia.

The project proposes excursion tours featuring Takayma, Kanazawa, Tateyama and Kurobe, starting and terminating at Chubu International Airport, Centrair, unlike the traditional excursions from Tokyo and Osaka. Itineraries with a combination of Tokyo and Osaka are possible as well to further stimulate inbound travel demand from Indonesia. In the end of last November, Garuda Indonesia-Japan organized a study tour including business negotiations, inviting a total of 29 people from travel agencies and travel media of Indonesia. The study tour participants saw, among others, snow and Japanese historical and cultural spots including the World Heritage sites as touristic attractions. Meanwhile, 10 travel agencies in Indonesia started selling package tours, producing tour brochures titled “Japan Alpen.”

With the booming economy in Indonesia, the number of Indonesian travelers with a sightseeing purpose continues to increase. The total number of visitor arrivals in Japan from Indonesia during 2008 rose by 3.8 percent year-on-year to 66,593, of whom 40,494 were tourists, posting a 5.4 percent increase. (Source: JNTO) According to Kiyoshi Suizu, Marketing and Sales Manager, Nagoya Branch, Garuda Indonesia, acting as the project booster, Indonesia has the world’s fourth largest population of approximately 230 million. The wealthy class people are traveling to Europe and Australia. In an effort to stimulate travel demand on the Japan routes, Garuda Indonesia wants to motivate these wealthy people to travel to Japan, Suizu said.

Source: Travel Vision

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