to Bali and Indonesia generally to help tourist numbers during the downturn. Very good to see more Russians come as they stay at least a week, go out around the island, and are top spenders. Many of the nearer Asian visitors are short stayers but every one counts.
Bisnis.com reports that Russian Transaero Airlines will soon commence flights between Moscow and Bali in order to serve the growing demand for Bali holidays from their home market.
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Founded in 1991, Transaero is the second largest Russian international carrier with a fleet of 42 airplanes flying to 86 destinations.
The new service, announced by Indonesia's Director General of Tourism Marketing, Sapta Nirwandar, while he was attending the International Tourism Bourse (ITB) in Berlin, is intended to help the Country realize the targeted 70,000 Russian tourists for 2009. In 2008, a total of 65,362 Russians visited Indonesia, an increase of 39.21% over the previous year. Russian travel to Indonesia is overwhelmingly focused on Bali with 58,233 (89%) coming to Bali in 2008.
In order to help Indonesia achieve ambitious arrivals totals in the midst of the current global economic crisis, the government has granted "special" licenses to six airlines to add flights to Indonesia. The six airlines given wider rights to fly to Indonesia are: Singapore Airlines, Shanghai Airlines, China Eastern Airlines, Transaero Airlines (Russia), Firefly (Malaysia) and Hong Kong Express.
Source: http://www.balidiscovery.com