Bali to reopen its tourism by October if coronavirus cases remained low

As the coronavirus infection spread across the world, so did tourism-related losses. Many countries like Malaysia, Italy, Greece, Spain which dependent on tourist for a significant part of their GDP suffered colossal losses. However, Bali, a popular island in Indonesia is planning to set its door open for tourists in the coming few months.

As of now, the holiday spot has recorded 343 cases of COVID-19, which is significantly low as compared to Indonesia's nationwide all. Banking upon it, the tourism industry recently announced that if rate of infection continued to stay low they would consider it opening for tourists by October. 

Starving Balinese 

Speaking to international media reporter, Ross Taylor, the president of the Indonesia Institute reportedly reckoned that the residents of Bali depended mainly on tourism for their income adding that they “won’t have much” to keep themselves alive without tourism. He then went on to reveal that the amount of saving of Balinese would last about one or two weeks. He further said families in Bali were actually starving. 

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Australia, which makes up for most tourists visiting the scenic island, still has international travel restrictions in place. Australia's chief medical officer recently opposed loosening travel restrictions and said that a charge chunk of the new COVID-19 infection wee imported cases, that is, people who were returning from abroad. Australia has reported a total of 7,054 cases. 

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This comes a day after the Italian government announced that it will throw open its borders next month, effectively ending Europe's longest and strictest coronavirus lockdown just as the summer tourism season gets underway. Both regional and international borders will open June 3, with the government eliminating a 14-day quarantine for anyone arriving from abroad. Many hope the move will revive a decimated tourist industry, which is worth 13 per cent of Italy's gross domestic product. Such an opening is exactly what tourism operators have been waiting for -- even if European neighbours so far appeared to be wary of the unilateral Italian announcement.