The Japanese outbound market is still buoyant, despite the 11 March disasters that damped consumer confidence in the country and impacted many people’s travel plans. According to a new report from the PATA Strategic Intelligence Center, the Japan National Tourism Organization (JNTO) estimates that outbound travel from Japan has dropped by around 3.6% year-on-year over the last five months. Even with this decline in outbound traffic Japan has generated close to 6.4 million departures in the five months to May 2011, and a number of destinations in the Asia Pacific region have actually increased their market share of Japanese arrivals.
Countries that have boosted their market share of Japanese travellers include Thailand, Sri Lanka and Singapore. All have expanded their inbound counts from Japan with each destination showing double-digit growth rates in May relative to the corresponding period last year. Initial figures for June 2011 show this momentum continuing in Thailand, Nepal, Chile and Vietnam. Year-to-date, 15 destinations in Asia Pacific have recorded increased Japanese arrivals, with nine of those destinations showing double-digit gains.
There also appears to be some small signs of recovery in visitors travelling to Japan. The estimated foreign inbound figure to Japan in May was 358,000, up from 295,800 in April. Many Asian source markets such as Taiwan, Thailand and Singapore produced better performances in May.
Nevertheless, PATA statistics show that foreign arrivals into Japan have declined 32% in the year-to-May – a sharp reversal of the positive growth trend seen in January and February.
According to UBM Aviation, the scheduled international air seat capacity to and from Japan is listed as around 6.1 million for July 2011, some 2.5% behind that of July 2010 but virtually identical to the capacity available in July 2009. All airports in Japan are open and in operation, including Sendai airport in the worst affected northeast area of Japan.
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