Menparkraf Prepares New SOPs For Tourism In The Middle Of The COVID-19 Pagebluk

President of the Republic of Indonesia Joko Widodo. (Photo: Setkab)

JAKARTA - Minister of Tourism and Creative Economy (Menparekraf) Wishnutama Kusbandio said that his party would prepare standard operating procedures (SOPs) in the midst of the COVID-19 event to support the tourism sector and the creative economy.

"Of course the SOP will be applied in the tourism sector and will be prepared in various fields. The SOP has many things to do, for example in hotels, restaurants, and will be applied including to various fields in tourism and the creative economy," Wishnutama said in a statement. press conference broadcast on the Cabinet Secretariat YouTube account, Thursday, May 28.

After this operational standard has been prepared, the next step is that the Ministry of Tourism will conduct a simulation against these standards. If the simulation has been carried out, then socialization and testing will be carried out. In its implementation, Wishnutama said, his party would prioritize areas that were ready.

"Because of that we have coordinated with the regional heads who will be ready in the future to carry out these stages," said the former media boss.

On this occasion, Wishnutama also touched on changes in future tourism trends as conveyed by President Joko Widodo. He said, in the new normal era, there are certain things that will certainly become the concern of tourists, such as hygiene, health and safety factors or what is commonly called quality tourism.

"Well, thank God, prior to the occurrence of COVID-19, Kemenparekraf has indeed launched a shifting from quantity tourism to quality tourism before the occurrence of this COVID-19," he said.

According to him, the ranks of the tourism and creative economy ministries have been preparing things that are included in quality tourism so that when tourism is in the middle of this new normal, it only needs to improve. "This is very important in the new normal era and once again together with the president conveyed that these preparations must be carried out carefully and in detail," he said.

Previously reported, President Joko Widodo (Jokowi), asked the Minister of Tourism Wishnutama Kusubandio to immediately prepare a special strategy to promote tourism in the new era of normality. He asked the Minister of Tourism to focus more on encouraging domestic tourism and domestic tourists.

As a first step, Jokowi then asked the Minister of Tourism to identify which tourism areas were ready to be visited because they were in areas with low transmission rates.

"I ask to identify tourist areas, tourist destinations that have R0 below 1 and Rt below 1 so that we can really gradually open up the tourism sector but at the same time with tight controls," said Jokowi when opening a limited meeting regarding the normal order. new in the productive and safe tourism sector COVID-19, Thursday, May 28.

Returning to the above, Jokowi also requested that the tourism promotion program prepared by the Minister of Tourism must simultaneously intensify domestic-made products and domestic tourism attractions.

He did not target the timing of this tourism implementation, but Jokowi asked for a number of steps to be prepared. Including strict supervision, so that there will not be the spread of COVID-19 even though tourism is reopened.

"Once again please follow this field closely before we open it so that both domestic and foreign tourists can travel safely and the community can be productive, especially for tourism players," he concluded.