Palembang beautifies tourist attractions to welcome Asian Games 2018

id jembatan ampera, sungai musi

Palembang beautifies tourist attractions to welcome Asian Games 2018

Musi Triboatton Championship 2015. (Foto Antarasumsel.com/13/Feny Sely/Aw)

Jakarta (ANTARA Sumsel) - Palembang City, the capital of South Sumatra Province, is busy beautifying its tourist attractions.

The city is gearing up for the 18th Asian Games, a regional sporting event for Asian nations, to be co-hosted by Palembang and Jakarta in 2018.

Thousands of athletes from 54 countries are expected to participate in the games.

The South Sumatra provincial administration in general, and the Palembang municipality government in particular, are determined to use the event to promote its tourism attractions in order to attract as many tourists as possible.

For that purpose, they have been busy improving and renovating several tourist attractions in the city, and developing infrastructure and facilities to support the tourism industry.

An investor has expressed interest in investing in the tourism industry in Palembang.

The businessman intends to invest Rp70 billion particularly to beautify the Kemaro Isle tourist site, one of the icons of Palembang, Isnaini Madani, head of the Palembang Tourism Office, said. He did not reveal the identity of the investor.

Kemaro Isle is a small delta, nearly six kilometers from Ampera Bridge, in the middle of the Musi River.

Currently, Kemaro Isle has 10 bungalows, a pier, a suspension bridge, and several other public facilities.

The Palembang administration always welcomes the participation of private businessmen in developing the city`s tourism industry.

The Kemaro Isle tourist attraction will be part of a tourism package that includes other attractions along the Musi River, which is Indonesia`s longest river, stretching 750 km on Sumatra Island.

The Palembang municipality administration has set a target of drawing one million tourists in 2017, and 2.5 million in 2018 coinciding with the Asian Games.