May 19, 2025, 3:14 p.m. | Reading time: 8 minutes
On a recent trip, our author Robin Hartmann experienced Balial's wonderfully diverse, often fantastically beautiful and fascinating place. But even in the deepest off-season, tourists from all over the world were swarming everywhere, while the excavators and cranes used to build new accommodation never seemed to stand still. Through conversations he found out what this was doing to the island and the local people. And found out about a new project that will bring even more tourists in the future.
It is evening on the beach in Sanur, a small town near Denpasar, the capital of Bali. Tourists and locals stroll along the well-kept promenade, a few people bathe in the sea, while a polychrome sunset creates a true color spectacle in the sky. But if you look up, you will also notice, at least at second glance, a rather cloudy impression of the idyll. Because it feels like every two minutes, maybe even more regularly, a plane comes out of the clouds to land at Denpasar Airport. And it brings even more vacationers, among whom some regions of the island are already groaning. And like many times during my three-week stay, I ask myself: Can Bali handle any more tourists?
This impression came to me in my first days on the dream island in the hip beach town of Canggu. Hyped by international bloggers and loved by surfers from all over the world for its good wave conditions, the place seemed to me from the start like a huge, completely overcrowded open-air discotheque. From evening until late at night, the bass booms through head-high speakers, offers such as “happy hour all day”, “free beer with a haircut” and countless tattoo studios attract a primarily young, international clientele. This backdrop is accompanied by construction noise almost around the clock from early in the morning, something new was being built everywhere and old things were being torn down.
Nobody wants to work in agriculture anymore
“Silence is a luxury in Bali,” the manager of an upscale establishment told me, while in the background workers had been jackhammering an area very close to the pool and the quieter accommodation since seven in the morning. She herself was not a local, but French, and only the first of numerous acquaintances of this kind on the island. Hardly any of the chic hotels and restaurants, hardly any of the beach clubs or resorts on Bali belong to locals. They tend to work, often invisibly, in the background, cleaning, cooking and building for progress, the profits of which they hardly have a share in.
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This now poses a massive danger for the future of the island, as taxi driver Adi reveals to me on one of our tours together. Hardly any young people in Bali want to work in agriculture these days, which has fed the entire island and its guests for centuries thanks to the extremely fertile soil. The numerous tourist-oriented colleges and university faculties, on the other hand, recorded a steadily growing number of visitors. And where rice fields once stretched to the horizon, they have had to give way more and more, especially in recent years. “My grandparents still farm a piece of land,” says Adi. "But none of us younger family members know how to order it anymore. We'll probably rent it out or sell it after she dies."
10 million additional guests per year
Adi also reports on the new airport that the Indonesian government has just approved for Bali. In the north of the island, near the town of Kubutambahan, it will welcome guests for the first time in 2027, as the news site “Channel News Asia” confirms. This region of the island is still completely underdeveloped in terms of tourism compared to the south. Especially fans of peace and nature come here to relax away from the crowds in the south. I personally experienced in the northern towns of Bedugul and Lovina that tourism here has not yet reached the same level. This will soon be over, as the government expects the new airport to bring 10 million additional guests to the island every year. Spread over 85,000 flights.
The construction sounds like a very ambitious fantasy project. The new airport is to be built on an artificial island with an area of 900 hectares that was specially created for this purpose off the coast. The terminal is said to be in the shape of a sea turtle, a sacred animal in Bali. Planners expect no fewer than 200,000 new jobs from the mega-construction, which will also include a toll road and a new railway line. There are also plans to turn the region into a mecca for ambitious film projects, working title “Baliwood”. Understatement looks different. And there is already not only enthusiasm but also resistance in the affected region.
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Can Bali handle even more tourists?
First of all, there is the fear of the unique nature that would be endangered or destroyed by the new construction projects. There are also fears of the consequences of overtourism, as is already the case in the south of the island. The argument: By building new, high-priced real estate, poorer people in particular would be pushed out of their homes in the long term. One also asks the not entirely unjustified question as to whether Bali actually needs more tourists or can even cope with them. In 2024, almost 24 million people from all over the world came to the Indonesian island. There is also criticism that the estimated three billion dollar construction costs for the airport will probably be paid for by a Chinese consortium.
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One concern is that the new airport in Bali could turn out to be a billion-dollar grave due to the lack of connections to the rest of the island, at least so far. It currently takes three to four hours from Denpasar to the Buleleng region, where it is to be built, due to the road conditions. In contrast, in the south, which is sometimes completely overcrowded with tourists, the streets are so congested, especially during the high season in July and August, that there were repeated reports of holidaymakers having to walk kilometers with their luggage to Bandara International Airport. Nevertheless, explorations are already underway to determine whether and how its capacity could be increased to 32 million passengers by 2031, if possible. There are already up to 400 landings and departures here every day.
Garbage problem and water shortage in Bali
The consequences that the new airport would have for Bali and Buleleng cannot be foreseen. What is certain is that the region is not only the most populous on the entire island, but also the one with the highest rates of unemployment and poverty. Certainly, not a few people would welcome the prospect of new perspectives that tourism could create. Meanwhile, “Fodor’s Travel Guide” has put Bali at the top of its infamous “no-list” for 2025, Sunnytrips reported. So list of destinations you shouldn't visit. The site primarily criticizes the massive waste problem that arises on the island due to overtourism: 33,000 tons of waste end up in Bali's rivers, on beaches and in the sea every year. Groundwater that is urgently needed to irrigate the fields is diverted to benefit tourist facilities.
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As early as 2007, the environmental protection association “WWF” warned: “The development of tourism in Bali has occurred quickly and without planning. And without first thinking about rules for sustainable development. This has caused serious damage to the environment on the island.” Ultimately, not only the fragile ecosystem but also Bali's cultural identity would be in question. However, freeing oneself from dependence on tourism in the long term is almost impossible. Today, 50 percent of the gross domestic product already comes from its income.
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