Japan National Tourism Organization (JNTO) reported that the number of international visitors to Japan in May 2019 was just up 3.7% year on year to 2,675,052, which were record-high for May.
Visitors from China were up 13.1% to 756,400 (+13.1%), which was the top market, however visitors reduced to 603,400 from South Korea (-5.8%), 426,500 from Taiwan (-3.1%) and 189,000 from Hong Kong (-0.8%).The reductions resulted from higher product prices in the Golden Week period in Japan and also their trends to avoid congestion in the period, according to JNTO.
JNTO also said that travel destinations selected in East Asia have recently been diversified to cheaper countries like Vietnam or Thailand.
As a whole, extension of the international air network and consecutive promotional campaigns still boosted the inbound travel market. Visitors from all of U.S., Australia and Europe particularly increased, and double-digit growths were seen in U.S., Canada and Australia.
The record-high results on a single month basis were seen in India, and the record-high results for March in China, Thailand, Malaysia, Philippines, Vietnam, Australia, U.S., Canada, U.K., France, Germany, Italy Russia and Spain.
