As it opened doors cautiously for international tourists, Indonesia’s holiday island of Bali welcomed its first direct flight carrying foreign tourists on Thursday. There were handful of visitors on board. They entered strict quarantine on arrival.
A Garuda Indonesia flight from Tokyo landed in Bali in the afternoon, with six Japanese and six Indonesians on board.
Although the island officially opened to Chinese, Japanese and New Zealand tourists in mid-October, there had been no direct non-cargo flights.
The six foreign tourists were travelling using business visas since the new rules for tourists were not ready when they applied to come.
Indonesia has said restarting international flights is intended to boost Bali’s battered tourism sector, which usually accounts for 54% of its economy.
Known for its surfing, temples, waterfalls and nightlife, Bali drew 6.2 million foreign visitors in 2019, the year before COVID-19 struck.
The entire country recorded just 1.6 million foreign visitors last year, down 61.57% from 2020.
However, Indonesia is maintaining much stricter quarantine requirements than Southeast Asian neighbours Thailand, which resumed quarantine-free entry for vaccinated visitors from Tuesday (February 1) and the Philippines, which will do the same from February 10.
Vaccinated tourists to Bali must quarantine between five and seven days at hotels or on vessels offshore.
Bali’s slow reopening comes as Indonesia has been seeing a steady increase in COVID-19 cases, primarily driven by the Omicron variant.
The country on Wednesday (February 2) reported nearly 18,000 infections, the highest tally since August.
(With inputs from agencies)
