Japan National Tourism Organization (JNTO) reported in the “2016 Foreign Visitors & Japanese Departures” report published on October 19 that the country posted a record 1.918 million international tourist arrivals in September 2016, up by 19.0% YoY.
Visitor arrivals from East Asia to Japan continued to rise, thanks to the September public holidays of China and South Korea, newly launched air routes, increased flights and cruise visits. The country saw 17.978 million international tourist arrivals from January to September in 2016.
China is still the largest source market for Japan, and visitor arrivals from China grew 6.3% to 522,300 in September. Arrivals from China totaled 5.0072 million in the first nine months of this year, exceeding the full-year arrival number of 4.99 million in 2015.
China has become the first country to have contributed more than 5 million visitor arrivals to Japan. Arrivals from South Korea, the second largest source market for Japan, totaled 430,600 in September, and from Taiwan 347,500. (Translated by Jerry)
