Stakeholders from Jakarta’s business events industry have come forth to urge the city’s administration to reinstate the Jakarta Convention and Exhibition Bureau (JCEB), to ensure there is sufficient financial backing to help the capital win business events post-pandemic.
In 2016, JCEB was terminated by the city government after 20 years of operation.
These views were aired by stakeholders during a hearing with Dadang Solihin, Jakarta’s deputy governor in charge of culture and tourism, who requested input as the city government was preparing to issue business events regulations.
Before the pandemic, Indonesia lagged behind neighbouring countries like Malaysia, Singapore, and Thailand, in terms of the number of business events, said Hosea Andreas Rungkat, chairman of the Indonesian Exhibition Companies Association.
However, that has all changed due to the pandemic, as it has forced all countries to restart their courting of business events, Hosea noted.
“This is the opportunity to prepare a better marketing strategy, including forming a new CVB for Jakarta, so that after this pandemic ends, Indonesia’s MICE industry stood a chance to be on a level playing field with her neighbouring countries,” he said.
Christina Rudatin, lecturer of State Polytechnic of Jakarta and head of MICE Department Forum, said: “Jakarta has the opportunity to win bids. However, the list of potential business events were never used nor mapped by the Jakarta administration because the capital had no CVB.”
According to ICCA data, Christina pointed out that there were only 800 international business events slated from 2019 to 2029.
She lamented: “After the closure of JCEB, Jakartd has no focused marketing strategy and action plans on business tourism.”
Ndang Mawardi, president director and CEO of InspiroGroup, also pointed out: “We have difficulty answering questions about support from the Jakarta government when bidding for the hosting of international events in the capital, as there was no formal support structure.”
Dadang has indicated that he will be reading through the proposed business events draft, and convey the proposal of the reinstatement, or setting up, of a city CVB, to Anies Baswedan, the governor of Jakarta.
