Global Recession Threat Haunts The Tourism Industry, Hotel And Restaurant Entrepreneurs Ask For Tax Relaxation

JAKARTA - The Association of Indonesian Hotels and Restaurants (PHRI) DKI Jakarta is aware of the threat of a global recession that will occur this year.

Entrepreneurs also asked the government to provide fiscal and monetary policy relaxation.

Jakarta PHRI BPD Chairman Sutrisno Iwantono said the tourism sector, especially the hotel and restaurant industry, had experienced improvement in 2022, after previously being hit by the COVID-19 pandemic for two years from 2020 to 2021.

He admits that he is optimistic that this condition will still be maintained in 2023 even though the threat of a global recession is haunting the hotel industry.

“On the field, there are still many things that we feel are still obstacles. This global recession will definitely occur, that's why we ask the government to continue to maintain demand, so that hotel and restaurant guests are maintained," he said in a virtual press conference, Tuesday, January 17.

Sutrisno said, there are two ways the government can do to help hotel and restaurant industry players in maintaining demand or visits to hotels and restaurants, namely relaxation in the fiscal and monetary fields.

"First, the field of monetary policy is softer, don't chase too many arrears first. So there is relaxation. Then in the fiscal sector, we also hope that in terms of tax revenue, don't be too chased first, yes, in a reasonable sense," he said.

For example, said Sutrino, the tightening of tax collection in DKI Jakarta is an increase in advertisement tax by up to 275 percent.

"Including, for example, we discussed earlier with the DKI Government that the 275 percent increase in advertisement tax is very burdensome, therefore we ask that this be reviewed," he explained.