News
Japanese guest nights in Japan were down 35% in 2021 compared to 2019
The total number of Japanese guest nights in the calendar year of 2021 was down 0.2% year on year to 310.8 million, which were 35.3% fewer guests nights than 2019. The occupancy rate was 34.5% overall, 28.2 lower points than 2019.
Airbnb signs a Workcation agreement with Okinawa to help create relationship travelers and local experiences
Airbnb Japan signed a Workcation agreement with Cabinet Office Okinawa General Bureau to create connections between guests and hosts and local communities in Okinawa to increase relationship and co-education travelers.
Baseball stadium ‘Tokyo Dome’ introduces a face recognition system for admission and payment
Baseball stadium ‘Tokyo Dome,' a home of Yomiuri Giants, introduced the Panasonic’s face recognition system for admission and payment on ‘facethru’ platform provided by Tokyo Dome.
A corporate group ‘ACT FOR SKY,’ including ANA and JAL, is launched for domestic commercialization of SAF
JGC Holdings Corporation, REVO International, ANA and JAL, as leader companies, launched ‘ACT FOR SKY,’ a corporate group to aim to commercialize Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) in Japan to establish a domestic supply chain for SAF from material purchase and manufacture to supply.
Ukraine crisis forces ANA to change the original Europe route to a 3.5 hours longer flight route over central Asia
ANA has shifted the Europe flight route over Russia to a route over central Asia since March 4 for a safety reason, extending flight hours to 15 hours and 30 minutes from Narita to Brussels.
Japanese travel industry group will perform a study tour to Finland in March in preparation for reopening cross-border travel
Travel Management Club, one of the travel industry groups in Japan, will perform a 5-days/3-nights study tour to Finland in March 2022 to verify challenges for restarting overseas travel.
JTB Group travel transactions reduced by 30% to 400 billion JPY in 2021 over 2019 despite well-recovery of domestic travel in December
Travel transactions of nine JTB Group companies were up 34.9% year on year to 398.1 billion JPY in 2021, but still down 30.1% compared to 2019 despite a 62.9% increase to 79.8 billion JPY in December 2021.
ANA launches a subscription trial for ‘living in a luxury hotel for a short period,’ offering 42 hotels in Japan
ANA X, a ANA Group company, has started a trial for multi-habitation subscription service, which offers ‘living in a luxury hotel for a short period’ on a monthly or weekly base. 42 luxury hotels nationwide are available for the service.
Car-centered travel seems to discourage young generation to visit Okinawa, as 30% of Japanese GenZ hesitate to use rent-a-car
Car-centered travel in Okinawa may discourage Generation Z and Millennium Generation to choose Okinawa as a leisure destination, as The Okinawa Development Finance Corporation survey shows 37.7% of them say ‘they do not hesitate to use rent-a-car.'
Metaverse ‘Virtual Osaka’ creates ‘New Cities’ to appeal Osaka toward EXPO 2025, connecting ‘Virtual Shibuya’ in the warp zone
Osaka Prefecture and Osaka City has started offering Metaverse ‘Virtual Osaka,' creating ‘New Cities’ virtually redesigned shopping streets and tourist spots in Osaka City, to appeal Osaka toward EXPO 2025 Osaka Kansai.
Japanese travel consumption was down 58% to 9 trillion JPY in 2021 compared to pre-pandemic 2019
The total amount of Japanese travel consumption was down 8.5% year on year to 9.1 trillion JPY in 2021, which were 58.4% less than 2019. The total number of travelers was down 9.0% year on year to 267 million.
More than 70,000 Japanese travelers departed overseas in January 2022, the most since the pandemic happened
The number of Japanese overseas travelers were 75,000 in January 2022, marking the most Japanese departures a month since the pandemic happened.
Japan Tourism Agency launches ‘Second Hometown Project’ to exploit regular travelers to a particular region
Japan Tourism Agency (JTA) has launched ‘Second Hometown Project’ to exploit regular travelers to a particular countryside region, subsidizing up to 20 million JPY a project for local governments, DMOs or private business providers.
ANA enters ‘Air Taxi’ service in earnest, partnering a U.S. eVTOL maker and Toyota
ANA Holdings signed a partnership agreement with U.S.-based Joby Aviation for the future ‘Air Taxi’ service in Japan, joined by Toyota Motor for development of ground-based transportation.
Japanese government will ease the border restrictions on March 1, maintaining the most severe level among G7 nations
Japanese prime minister Fumio Kishida officially announced that the current border restrictions will gradually be eased on March 1, adding that the most severe level among G7 nations will be maintained.
45 major travel companies of Japan recovered sales in total to nearly 50% of the 2019 level in December 2021
sales of 45 major travel companies increased by 31.6% year on year to 174 billion JPY in total in December 2021. Compared to two years ago, the result recover to a 54% decrease.
KNT-CT considerably improved sales for the first nine months of FY2021 due to an increase in non-travel businesses
KNT-CT Holdings increased sales for the first nine months of FY2021 (April to December 2021) by 71.4% year on year to 104.9 billion JPY because it succeeded in increasing sales of non-travel businesses.
ANA begins serving Travel Ready pre-flight verification for international flights to U.S., Europe and China
ANA has just begun receiving required COVID-19 certifications and other documents for its ANA Travel Ready service on 20 flights on 19 routes in total from Tokyo Haneda and Tokyo Narita to the U.S., Europe and China.
Japan Tourism Agency subsidizes ‘development of sustainable tourism’ for local regions
Japan Tourism Agency subsidizes sustainable tourism contents development program to supports part of expenses on facility development or purchases of goods necessary for sustainable tourism.
The most-taken SDGs action by Japanese travelers is ‘to avoid crowd,’ while awareness to food loss or plastic bag is low
JTB Tourism Research & Consulting survey shows that 12.2% of targeting 3,000 Japanese travelers regard ‘concrete actions to climate change’ as the most important goal, and the most-taken SDGs action in traveling is ‘to avoid crowd’ with 33.4%. #Japan #Travel #research
