70 villages in S Kalimantan to be developed as tourist villages

Banjarmasin, S Kalimantan (ANTARA) - As many as 70 out of 1.864 villages in South Kalimantan have the potential to be developed as touris villages and new tourist destinations to attract local and national tourists visit.

Head of the South Kalimantan Village Community Development (DPMD) Zulkifli here on Wednsday (March 11, 2020) said, the provincial government is currently working hard to explore new tourism potentials in the region.

"From 1.864 villages in South Kalimantan, there are 70 villages spread across several districts have the potential to be developed as tourist villages," he said.

At present, several government working units (SKPD) collaborate to develop tourist villages. Even Tiwingan Village in Banjar District has been chosen as the fourth best village from 70 thousand villages in Indonesia in terms of managing the tourist village program.

The effort of the provincial government, Zulkifli said, received the support from the central government, including through organizing training for five days, for communities living in the customary community areas.

The training organized by Banjarmasin Community Training Center (Balatmas) was attended by 80 participants from Banjar, Tanah Laut, and Central Hulu Sungai (HST) districts.

One of the participants, who represented the tourism awareness group (pokdarwis) of Panjaratan Village, Asmani, told that this time the village is developing bekantan river cruising tour.

The tourist area which is also a forest area, covering an area of about seven kilometers, is managed by the local pokdarwis. It is visited by many tourists, especially on weekends, as they mostly were students.

He said, the training, which materials included the effort to develop a tourist village, ways to help people to understand what tourist village is, and effort to promote tourist area, was very helpful.

"This training is very helpful and we will run it for our village," he said.