Up to 30,000 Indonesian nationals travel to Germany every year and the numbers continue to increase.
Time for the German tourism promotion to become more visible in Indonesia. Since 2015 EKONID has been supporting the German National Tourism Board (GNTB) in analyzing the market potential and relevant stakeholders. As part of the ASEAN Roadshow 2017 the first GNTB delegation came to Jakarta within the time period 18-19 October 2017. Other cities that were visited as part of the roadshow were Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur and Singapore. The delegation comprised representatives from GNTB Germany and Singapore as well as companies and institutions representing the German Tourism industry: Activo Travel GmbH, Berlin Tourismus + Kongress GmbH, Düsseldorf Airport, Frankfurt Airport, KaiYuan Information & Business GmbH, Lufthansa and Maritim Hotels.
In Jakarta EKONID organized a networking dinner and a Schengen-visa-workshop in cooperation with the German Embassy Jakarta. The networking dinner in the restaurant Plataran Menteng was attended by more than 30 representatives of the Indonesian outbound tourism industry. The evening was moderated by the Singapore-based GNTB representative. Since January 2017 GNTB has its own ASEAN representation in Singapore.
For the next day EKONID organized a Schengen-visa-briefing in cooperation with the German Embassy. We would like to thank Mr. Gregor Fiedler, Head of Visa Section, for his time to brief the representatives of the Indonesian travel agencies and to be available for questions regarding issues the travel agents are faced with when it comes to the application for the Schengen visa. One major concern is the limited number of available visa interview slots. In this regards Mr. Fiedler convey very positive news. Starting mid of next year the German Embassy intends to involve a service agency in processing the visa applications. The additional support will enable the Embassy to process more visa applications, thus opening the doors for more Indonesian tourist in Germany.