JAKARTA: Indonesia is looking to increase the number of tourists to the resort state of Bali. As a precursor to a planned advertising campaign, the government and partners are to build 60 new hotels on the island. Indonesia's tourist island Bali will have 10,466 hotel rooms in 2014 with the 60 new hotel projects under construction, property research agency Knight Frank has predicted, citing government information. Supply of hotel rooms in Bali has continued to grow with 3,922 additional rooms in the second half of the year, Senior Associate Director of Knight Frank, Fakky Hidayat, said on Wednesday. Over the next two years, the hotel rooms on the resort island would total 10,466 units, Fakky was quoted as saying. In the first half of the year, five-star hotels contributed the largest number or 37.7 percent to the total number of hotel rooms in Bali, he said. The second largest number was contributed by four-star hotel accounting for 31.3 percent followed by three-star hotels accounting for 31 percent, he said. The largest number of the new hotels would be built in Kuta until 2014, he said. He said that four-star hotels grew faster in number in Bali with the growing number of domestic and foreign tourists. The number of four-star hotels rose 50.2 percent with 3,358 rooms in the first half of the year. The number of rooms of five star hotel totaled only 924 units in Nusa Dua, he said. Four-star hotels are dominant in Seminyak, Sanur and Legian with rooms 691 units, 1,025 units and 617 units respectively. For tour operators in Jakarta and elsewhere, they told Bikyamasr.com that the increase in hotels and space will hopefully translate into a reduction in prices and availability for customers. “We have seen prices really rise in recent years and this has hurt the industry, so hopefully these new rooms and hotels will push the price down a bit,” said one tour operator in the capital.
