Jakarta (VNA) – The Indonesian Government willstart offering cash assistance to workers in the tourism industry sometime betweenlate November and early December, Indonesian Finance Minister Sri MulyaniIndrawati has said.

Each beneficiary will receive 600,000 IDR (over 42 USD) incash which is distributed in three installments, she told a recent virtual pressconference after a cabinet meeting.

This social subsidy programme has been devised by thenational economic recovery commission under the guide of Coordinating Ministerof Economic Affairs Airlangge Hartarto, she said, adding that details of theprogramme will be announced by Hartarto later.

The Ministry of Tourism and Creative Economy is expected tosoon issue guidelines on requirements and who are eligible to receive theassistance.

Indrawati said she hopes the programme will benefit workers intourism – the sector hit the hardest by COVID-19, but refused to disclose thebudget for the programme.

At the end of September, Minister Indrawati announced thatIndonesia will allocate 9.2 trillion IDR from the State budget for 2022 to supportthe recovery of tourism post-pandemic.

Minister of Tourism and Creative Economy Sandiaga Uno hasrecently revealed that nearly 2 million tourism workers in Indonesia are atrisk of losing jobs.

According to Uno, before the pandemic, tourism was thesecond largest foreign currency earner after the oil and gas sector. However,in 2020, the revenue from tourism only reached 3.54billion USD, down nearly 80 percent compared to 2019./.