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THE INDONESIAN Ministry of Tourism encourages strengthening collaborative steps in strengthening the country’s sports tourism potential as one of the main strategies to increase the contribution of the tourism sector to the national economy.
According to the Minister of Tourism, Widiyanti Putri Wardhana, when she was present at the launch of the “Mandalika MotoGP Book 2025: Economic Acceleration, Image and Tourism as well as starting the preparation of the Grand Design for the Development of the National Sports Industry” at the Bappenas Building, recently said that we believe that this grand design will be an important foundation that will further strengthen the position of sports tourism as one of the motors for Indonesia’s tourism growth in the future.
“Therefore, we need to continue to work together so that sports tourism in Indonesia can grow better. Sports is one of the tourism themes that has great potential to continue to be developed. Globally, sports have proven to be a very effective tourism magnet,” she said.
Widiyanti explained that an Expedia survey stated that 44% of tourists were willing to travel abroad for the sports entertainment they wanted with an average expenditure of US$1,500. This figure even exceeds the current average expenditure of tourists to Indonesia. UN Tourism also noted that sports tourism contributes 10% to total global tourist spending and will continue to grow by 17.5% until 2030.
“This opportunity feels closer for Indonesia because the lifestyle of our society is moving in the same direction. Indonesia, with its natural wealth and supporting infrastructure, has great potential in developing sports-based tourism. Various international standard events have recorded success in holding them in Indonesia,” she affirmed.
One of them is the Mandalika MotoGP, which when held in 2025 will have an economic impact estimated at IDR2.7–4.7 trillion. Apart from that, there is also HYROX Jakarta which will be held on 27-28 June 2026 with the number of participants reaching 11,500, making it the Hyrox event with the largest number of participants in Asia-Pacific, where 15% of them are foreign nationals.
Indonesia also has many sporting events with intellectual property such as the Jakarta International Marathon, as well as various events that leverage Indonesian tourism destinations such as the Geopark Run series.
Nevertheless, she added that the development of sports tourism also has a number of challenges. The first is equality, where sporting events must be able to spread and grow in every region, not only be concentrated in a few leading destinations.
“For this reason, the Ministry of Tourism consistently encourages regional governments, ministries/institutions, the private sector, and other tourism observers to design sporting events that are born from local character and uniqueness, not just replicating formats that have been tested in other places,” she noted.
The second challenge is related to the destination’s carrying capacity. The concentration of visits during the peak season for events sometimes puts excessive pressure on destination capacity. Starting from the availability of accommodation to other supporting infrastructure.
The next challenge is the continuity of visits beyond the event period. A mature sports tourism destination is a destination that remains alive and visited throughout the year. “This is why we continue to develop tourism products based on sports tourism as an attraction outside the event week,” Widiyanti elaborated.
Lastly, standardization of services, professionalism of organizers and good risk management are absolute prerequisites for world-class events.
The Minister of Tourism hopes that these four challenges can be identified and become an integral part of the preparation of the Grand Design for Sports Industry Development which begins together today.
“We express our high appreciation for what has been achieved in Indonesian sports events and sports tourism. An achievement that is already very good and will become even better after we solve the existing challenges together,” she concluded. [traveltext.id]
