LBHRC calls for Australian government to follow US lead with Bali travel advisory
(June 2008)

The Little Bali Hotel & Resort Company has again urged the Department of Foreign Affairs & Trade to rethink its current travel advisory on Bali.

The LBHRC call for action follows a US State Department statement issued on Sunday, 25 May advising its decision to lift its warning to the destination, in place since November 2000.

LBHRC founder Mike Parker-Brown said he was hopeful DFAT would quickly follow the US government lead in downgrading its current grade four ‘reconsider your need to travel’ advisory to a lower level.

“The US government has obviously recognised the investments the Indonesian government has made, financially, time wise and with manpower and technology, to make the destination much safer,” he said.

Parker-Brown said it was ironic that while the level four advisory had stood in place for more than five years, the government recommendation had done little to deter Australians visiting the destination in droves.

Bali, he said, is now receiving more Australian visitors than at any other time with hoteliers anticipating their best year ever following on from a 70 per cent increase in Australian business in 2007*.

*Figures released by the Indonesian government indicate Australian visitor arrivals to Bali for the period January to December 2007 totalled 204,421 compared to the 117, 969 total recorded for the same period in 2006.