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Whenever I discuss travel to Japan or living in Japan, most Americans assume I’m talking about Westerners. But the majority of Japan’s annual visitors aren’t from English-speaking countries. As we’ve documented countless times, the vast majority come from Asia.
China has, historically, been the top source of inbound travel to Japan. In the wake of the COVID-19 crisis, the top country has been South Korea for the past two years. Recently, however, according to the Japan National Travel Organization, inbound travel from China has spiked. The country’s poised to once again become the leading source of inbound tourism to the nation.
Or, at least, it was, until current Prime Minister Takaichi Sanae shot her mouth off.
In what the Japanese press is now reporting as an unscripted remark, Takaichi swore to come to Taiwan’s defense if China tried to use military force to back up its territorial claim on the island nation. (The original text prepared for Takaichi advised her to avoid commenting on the issue altogether.) That drew swift backlash from Beijing, which called on its citizens to cancel their travel plans to one of the world’s hottest travel destinations.
When Kristina Rin wrote about this issue for us a few weeks ago, the numbers didn’t look good. It seemed that enough people in China were responding to the government’s call to do some real damage to Japanese tourism.
Three weeks later, the numbers don’t lie. Chinese tourist cancellations are doing serious damage to Japan’s hospitality industry.
