Koster: Bali's Infrastructure Is Very Disadvantaged To Losing Competition With Thai Tourism

Bali Governor Wayan Koster asked the central government to support Bali as an international tourism destination with world-class infrastructure development.

While attending the launch of the "Keep Village" program at the Bali High Prosecutor's Office, Wayan Koster said Bali with an area of only 5,560 square kilometers (km2), a population of 4.4 million and a total of nearly 17 million tourists contributed greatly to Indonesia, especially in the economic sector.

"The contribution of Bali tourism foreign exchange (achieved) 44 percent of the national foreign exchange sourced from the tourism sector. However, Bali's high contribution to tourism and economic foreign exchange did not receive balanced support in terms of infrastructure development," he said, Thursday, September 11.

However, Koster did not mention in detail the amount of Bali's contribution to the country's foreign exchange, as well as what infrastructure the central government in Bali needs to build.

Koster wants Bali tourism to be supported in terms of international standard infrastructure so that it can compete with other countries in ASEAN, not equated with other regions in Indonesia.

"Infrastructure in Bali is far behind, resulting in the competitiveness of Bali tourism being left behind compared to Singapore, Thailand and Malaysia. So, tourism is a bit less competitive," he said.

Koster explained that tourism in Bali grew rapidly after the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2019 the number of foreign tourists visiting Bali was 6.2 million people, while in 2020 and 2021 it had only begun to recover in 2022.

In 2024, according to him, the number of foreign tourists visiting Bali will reach 6.4 million people or 46 percent of the number of foreign tourists visiting Indonesia.

From the beginning of the year to August 2025, he said, foreign tourist visits had reached 4 million people.

"Our estimate until December 2025 reached more than 7 million people. That is very important to maintain comfort, security and public order so that tourism in Bali is not disturbed so that there is no travel warning from foreign countries like what happened during yesterday's demonstration," he said.