Bali boosts services for foreign visitors

As a center of Indonesia's tourism industry and a place for various international events, Bali island is striving to boost its service qualities for tourists. The authorities at the beautiful tourist resort had been busy with keeping Kuta beach clean from huge amount of rubbish years ago, and now they aim to increase infrastructure facilities such as roads to alleviate chronic traffic congestion. Health authorities have been containing the threat of rabies that killed scores of people by conducting mass vaccination on dogs. Bali administration has planned to build a new underpass construction at the end of this year in a bid to help ease the congestion in Kuta, said Susalit Alius, head of the project committee for national road. "While the roadwork is under way, road users will be a little inconvenient. We hope the public will understand the underpass is being built to improve their lives," he was quoted by the Jakarta globe as saying. The traffic congestion in the island had drawn complaints from foreign tourists. "It will indirectly slow Bali's economic growth. Eventually Bali will lose many tourists and investment. Bali's special advantages will disappear," Bali Tourism Alliance Chairman Gusti Kade Sutawa was quoted by the Jakarta globe as saying. Foreigners living in Bali, the center of Indonesia's tourism industry, said they could not stand the island's chronic traffic congestion, and that it was beginning to impact its tourism industry. "The traffic really dampens the spirit of tourists visiting Bali, and there needs to be a solution," said U.S. citizen Radu Frentiu. Governor of Bali I Made Mangku Pastika said that an international-class hospital would be built on a 3-hectare land in Bali to serve foreign tourists, whose arrivals kept increasing. As many as 244,400 foreign holidaymakers visited Bali island in October 2011, a 6.43 percent increase over the same period last year, the Statistic Bureau announced on Dec. 1. "The hospital will provide an international standard of healthcare for the people, especially those who have references from community health centers or regency hospitals," Pastika was quoted by the Jakarta Post as saying. Indonesia aims to attract 7.7 million foreign tourists coming into the country this year and 8 million next year, Minister for Tourism and Creative Economy Mari Elka Pangestu said in November. Over 7 million foreign tourists came into the country last year, according to the tourism ministry. The government expects a 8.4-billion-U.S. dollar revenue from tourists' spending this year, up from 7.6 billion U.S. dollar last year.