JAKARTA ~

The tourism sector in East Indonesia needs to be developed to attract more tourists to come to Indonesia, representative from the Association of Young Entrepreneurs (Hipmi) Erik Hidayat said here on Sunday.

According to him the beautiful natural scenery in the eastern Indonesia regions had attracted many tourists domestic and foreign alike in the past years. Erik also said efforts to develop tourism in east Indonesia could be made to compete with other ASEAN countries in attracting more tourists to the region.

Erik expressed hope that the central and local governments would support the development of tourism in east Indonesia by providing better infrastructure there.

“The government must start pushing development of the tourism sector in east Indonesia,” said Erik.

Meanwhile the economic integration of ASEAN countries is scheduled to take place starting December 31, 2015. With the deadline approaching, ASEAN countries are gearing up to prepare themselves for open market implementation in the region.