Indonesia becomes top tourist destination for Australians with over one million visiting us this year (suck it, New Zealand)

By extrapolating statistics from  Indonesia’s Ministry of Tourism, we can predict that over one million Australians will have visited Indonesia before the end of 2014. This major milestone also means Indonesia will has surpassed New Zealand as the number one destination for Aussies on holiday.

In a story on the tourism trend, The Sydney Morning Herald cites Indonesian immigration figures which indicate more than 704,572 Australians have visited our archipelago since Jan. 1, 2014.  

If that rate holds up, the millionth Aussie should land here sometime in early December. 

That’s a huge change from 10 years ago, when nearly three times the number of Australians went to New Zealand as went to Indonesia.

The SMH story says Australians’ growing love affair with Bali (an affair that had a lot of room to grow after the low point of 2002’s terrorist bombing on the island) is the main cause behind the increasing numbers.

With the Indonesian government recently announcing that it would waive the $35 visa on arrival fee for Australian tourists (as well as those from China, Russia, South Korea and Russia) starting in 2015, there’s little reason to doubt this trend won’t increase for the foreseeable future. Now might be a very good time to start that vegemite importing business.

Source: Sydney Morning Herald 

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