Foreign Visitors To Japan: Updated March 27, 2025.

February foreign visitors to Japan hit monthly record of 3.26 million

Article Source: https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20250320/p2g/00m/0li/010000c

Ideas:

In terms of appeal to foreign visitors Japan seems to be on a roll ever since the pandemic ended. Of course the weak Japanese yen helps too has foreign visitors have more purchasing powers, which means they can buy more Japanese products, buy more Japanese food, stay at better hotels and go to many different tourist areas in Japan.

Its also interesting that maybe the price of airline tickets, which seems to have almost doubled since the pandemic ended as not deterred foreign tourists from going to Japan. I remember, before the pandemic, the tickets I used to get to go to Japan was almost half the price they are now, and again foreign tourists don't seem to be worried about the increase in airline ticket prices these days.

Its interesting that both Australia and the US are somewhat away compared to much of Asia, and looking at ticket prices again from the two countries again doesn't seem to deter tourists from these two countries from going to Japan.

Its understandable, being close to Japan that tourists from South Korea and China would choose Japan for a vacation, but for a very long time, it wasn't that way for South Korea.

For a very long time and maybe still for many in South Korea, there is resentment about Japan occupying South Korea for about 30 years in the 20th century. But it seems for many, that might be a long time ago as South Koreans now just want to enjoy Japan as much as any other group.

And of course there might still be some pent-up demand related to the pandemic when people couldn't travel, so maybe they are making up for lost time due to the pandemic.

While the record numbers are good and needed to help boost the Japanese economy, some Japanese cities and tourist areas are now going to add a tourist tax because of the over-crowding and too many tourists for example in the Kyoto area now.

If there tourist tax is too high it might discourage tourists from visiting that area, such as Kyoto which might put a 10,000 yen tourist tax on those who stay in Kyoto. A 10,000 yen tax might be like $100 if the currency rate was equal.

And again as Australia and the US is a little far away, that doesn't seem to deter those who want to go to Japan. For example, the last trip I took to Japan, as I was waiting for my bag at the baggage area, at Haneda Airport in Tokyo, I saw the city of Newark of New Jersey on the baggage claim area and thought that is a long way to go to get to Japan.

With the current exchange rate today a 10,000 yen is like $66.00 US dollars so that might or might not deter foreign tourists from visiting Kyoto.

While Japan has a long way to go to match France or even Spain in the number of tourists, it's a good start to maybe being the go to place in Asia for tourists, like France is for Europe.

The Japanese economy is kind of in stagnant phase now but slowly coming out of it. Its quite possible the surge in foreign tourists, with a weak Japanese yen, the Japanese economy with an even more surge in tourists could put the Japanese economy back on track for some significant growth.

But the challenge is some might think there are now too many tourists in Japan as maybe some areas have become over-crowded and some locals might not like it.

Record surges in foreign tourists are good and needed but the Japanese economy needs more than foreign tourists as it wants more Japanese consumer spending and more business investment and more exports to grow the Japanese economy.

Have a nice day!