JAKARTA, Aug. 23 (Xinhua) -- Indonesia was scheduled to host a rotating golf championship vied by competitors from Indonesia and Malaysia, slated from September 5 to 7 in a world-class golf course in Bogor, West Java, the tournament organizer said on Wednesday.
The golf championship, entitled "2017 Indonesian Golf Tour (IGT)-Professional Golf of Malaysia (PGM) Championship" , would be the second after the first in Malaysia last year.
"The golf tournament was aimed at developing quality of professional golfers in the respective countries," said the Head of Indonesia Golf Tour (IGT) Jimmy Masrin.
Each country would send teams of 12 golfers in the tournament that offers total rewards of 600 million rupiah (about 45,000 U.S. dollars), Jimmy added.
Indonesia Tourism Minister Arief Yahya said the golf tournament has significant potentialities to be developed into sport tourism event, as the country has many world-class golf courses which would attract golf enthusiasts from Japan, South Korea, Singapore and Malaysia where the sport is growing popularity among their middle class societies.
"We have 10 top golf courses in Batam and Bintan. There are also many others with similar classes in Jakarta and Bali, suited to accommodate tourism sport events with golf tournaments," the minister said.
