VOI - Voice of Indonesia | RRI - Radio Republik Indonesia

The Mountain Bike Cross Country Marathon which was held on Saturday (28/9) in Tanjung Lesung, Banten in the series of Tanjung Lesung festival events was won by the National Training Center Athlete Zainal Fanani in the Men Master Open category with a time of 2 hours 3 minutes 51 seconds. Met after the competition, Zainal revealed that he was also preparing himself for the SEA GAMES Manila, Philippines on 30 November 2019.

“SEA Games is now preparing for the SEA Games so we have been trained with the head coach for the upcoming SEA Games which take place in two months,” said Zainal.

Zainal added that in the 2019 SEA Games he would participated in the Olympic cross country mountain bike number or XCO. Together with other national training athletes, Rafika Farisi, Zainal targeting gold medal in the Southeast Asian sports competition. (NK/trans by PUTRI)

The Nordic countries, namely Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden are important partners for Indonesia. Bilateral cooperation between the Nordic countries and Indonesia, especially in the economic and development fields, has increased significantly. This was said by the Minister of National Development Planning / Head of the Indonesian National Development Planning Agency (Bappenas) Bambang Brodjonegoro in his remarks at the Nordic Night to commemorate the national days of Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden, in Jakarta, Thursday (9/26) night. Bambang added, the trade volume of Indonesia and the Nordic countries continued to increase in the last 2 years. He also hopes that there will be more foreign direct investment (FDI) from the four Nordic countries to Indonesia.

“Our combined trade volume continue to increase over the past 2 years. In 2018, we recorded a trade volume of 2.2 billion US dollars. In the area of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) I do hope to seek more capital inflows from all the 4 countries. In 2018 the registered combined value of FDI from Nordic countries was 39.7 billion US Dollars. I wonder if this figure could soon be doubled and place multi combined investment into the top 10 source of FDI in Indonesia,” said Bambang Brodjonegoro.

Bambang Brodjonegoro also welcomed the increasing number of tourists from the Nordic countries visiting Indonesia. He encouraged tourists from Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden, not only to visit Bali but also 10 other new tourist destinations. (VOI/AHM)

The Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) between the government of Indonesia and the European Union initiated since April 2016 marks the beginning of a new era of cooperation between Indonesia and the European Union. The document on the scope of the cooperation is intended as a basis for starting CEPA negotiations. From an Indonesian perspective, the Indonesia and European Union Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (IEU-CEPA) is a reflection of Indonesia's commitment to realize Indonesia as a more open and competitive economy. This was stated  by Bambang Priambodo, Deputy of Economic Affairs at the Ministry of Planning and National Development in a seminar  ‘the first National Dissemination for Aid Program in the ARISE + Indonesia Trade Sector in Jakarta, Wednesday (09/25). He also said that Indonesia and the European Union are negotiating a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) to facilitate and create new market access.

“Indonesia and the European Union are in the process of negotiating a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement with the main objective to facilitate and create the new market access, to increase trade between the EU and Indonesia as well as to expand the direct investment,” said Bambang Priambodo.

Bambang Priambodo further explained that Indonesia is a member of the G20 and Indonesia's economy is considered as the 16th largest in the world. He also viewed that with GDP growth of 5.6% over the last nine years, and a population of nearly 270 million, Indonesia needs to develop sustainable measures. Bambang also said that Indonesia still needs to invest US$ 1,000 million dollars in infrastructure in the next five years from the private sector, and mainly from foreign investors, because the government can only cover and provide less than 40% of this amount. (VOI/AHM)

Tourism industry in Indonesia is increasingly interesting. Beautiful nature adding with various amazing traditions and cultures, has managed to attract domestic and foreign tourists. This is proved by data which was released by Google, that searching related to tourism increases by 39 percent since early 2018 according to Google Trends. Industry Manager Google Indonesia, Zulfi Rahardian, in Jakarta, on Tuesday (Sept 24) said that Data on Google Search within the last 18 months showed a surge in the tourism industry in Indonesia.  

“We will try to discuss the digital economic potential for online tourism in Southeast Asia, especially in Indonesia. Indonesia is the largest country for online tourism in Southeast Asia. Based on the results of Google Temasek's research last year, the total number of flight and hotel transactions carried out online, there were around eight point six billion USD. That is total penetration also called growth's value. In the last few years the growth has reached 20 percent and we expect for the next few years until 2025 it will still grow by 17 percent each year. This illustrates the enormous potential of online tourism in Indonesia,” said Zulfi Rahardian.

Assistant Deputy of Strategic Management of Tourism Ministry, Ari Prasetyo said that there are around 70 percent tourism process conducted through digital, starting from seeking, searching, until booking ticket and accommodation. The increasing online tourism industry in Indonesia is encouraged by a number of factors, such as the growing online travel aggregator (OTA) which offers various features and services for the tourists. (VOI/RIZKY F/YATI/AHM)