Taylor Swift's concerts are believed to have brought in millions of dollars to Singapore’s economy. ST PHOTO: DESMOND WEE
JAKARTA: Strong ties between Singapore and Indonesia lay a solid foundation for the two countries to explore co-hosting major events in future, but both sides will have to be selective on which projects will play to their strengths, experts told The Straits Times.
The idea for potential bilateral cooperation on hosting major concerts and other international events was floated by Indonesia’s Tourism and Creative Economy Minister Sandiaga Uno on March 8, during his visit to Singapore amid pop singer Taylor Swift’s six-date concert series.
The shows in Singapore, which was Swift’s only stop in South-east Asia, wrapped up on March 9. They are believed to have brought in millions of dollars to Singapore’s economy.
DBS puts the dollar boost at between $300 million and $400 million, representing about 0.2 per cent of Singapore’s first-quarter gross domestic product.
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“Considering the recent Taylor Swift concert in Singapore, the Singaporean economy has seen a significant increase, as the concertgoers brought in five times more spending than the typical tourists,” Sandiaga said on March 10.
During his visit, the minister met Singapore’s Minister-in-charge of Trade Relations Grace Fu.
When asked for more details about the meeting, a spokesman for Singapore’s Ministry of Trade and Industry said: “The Singapore Government is always ready to explore ways to partner with Indonesia and our neighbours to attract more tourists to the region.”
Experts like Professor Lawrence Loh from the Department of Strategy and Policy at NUS Business School pointed out how the warm ties between the two countries mean there is vast potential for both to co-organise more events.
“It is a very good gesture that the Indonesian side took the lead and said, ‘Let’s work together’ on this,” he said.
Good relations allowed both sides to come to three key agreements in 2022 on the bilateral issues of airspace management, defence cooperation and extradition of fugitives, showing strong progress on issues that had bedevilled ties between the two nations for many years.
Singapore has been Indonesia’s top foreign investor since 2014, with total investments reaching $17.5 billion in 2022.
That year, Singapore was Indonesia’s fourth-largest trading partner, and Indonesia was Singapore’s sixth-largest trading partner, with bilateral trade reaching $74.6 billion.
The two countries have similar strengths that will work well together, said Prof Loh.
He highlighted how they both have venues large enough for concerts and sporting events, as well as exhibition spaces for meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions (Mice) events.
But both sides have to first identify which events are big enough and suitable to be hosted jointly, said Dr Siwage Dharma Negara, a senior fellow at the ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute and co-coordinator of its Indonesia Studies Programme.
“The current good bilateral relations are certainly important, but to make things happen and be successful, it requires business-to-business cooperation and creativity. The government can facilitate it, but it should not and cannot be the main player.”
Rebecca Neo, a research officer at the same institute, said a challenge for such events could be determining which aspect each country should oversee. She listed factors such as deciding hosting rights, finances, infrastructure and manpower breakdown.
“Given that big-scale concerts and other world events have rather fixed time periods in which they need to be organised, the long planning phase that usually comes with jointly hosted events could put performing groups off,” she said.
This, she added, might make it more tempting for performers to revert to the more usual practice of having the event or concert in one country.
While the idea of co-developing an event is a good one, it might boil down to what makes the most sense in terms of money, said Dr Mustafa Izzuddin, a senior international affairs analyst at policy and business consultancy Solaris Strategies Singapore.
Among other issues, there is a lack of safeguards to provide adequate security, especially in terms of preventing ticket scalping, which could hinder Indonesia from jointly organising successful mega events, said Dr Mustafa.
“As such, the other country – in this case, Singapore – may find it more prudent and convenient to organise mega events on their own,” he said.
Both sides, however, seem to be willing to give co-organising large events a shot, and work is already under way.
In December 2023, Singapore and Indonesia jointly submitted their interest to football’s world governing body Fifa to co-host the Under-20 World Cup in 2025, and Under-17 World Cup between 2025 and 2029.
Indonesian President Joko Widodo told reporters in Jakarta back then that he believed both nations can be good hosts.
Big sporting events are a potential area of cooperation for both Singapore and Indonesia as they will attract large crowds and take place over several weeks, said Dr Siwage.
Neo said music festivals could be a good start for both countries to work together on an event, especially given how South-east Asia has become known for some well-renowned music festivals like the annual We The Fest in Jakarta.
She outlined a possible approach where regional offshoots of international festivals could take place in both Singapore and Indonesia.
In this way, organising rights to a festival would belong to a festival’s country of origin, but regional expansions would mean that more fans would be able to see their favourite artists – and more money would be pumped into the host country’s economy.
One example of this is the Summer Sonic Bangkok 2024 musical festival, which is an offshoot of the famous Summer Sonic festival in Japan.
“In the same way, regional countries could adopt this method to expand some of our music festivals to be more regionally based instead of belonging to just one country,” said Neo. - The Straits Times/ANN
