The Tourism Agency announced that the number of foreign tourists who visited Japan in 2017 has increased to 29.77 million by 19.9% over the previous year which is the highest ever. The Abe administration has set a goal of 40 million foreign travelers visiting Japan in 20 years after the Tokyo Olympic and Paralympic Games will be held.

In the Kyushu area, the Kyusyu Regional *Bureau of Land, Infractructure, Transport and tourism announced that they confirmed the number of people entering the region from abroad during July 2017, it reached 445,277, representing a 21.4% increase compared to the same month last year.

It was record highs set for two *consecutive months. An increase in tourism has been identified as one of the major factors in this dramatic increase. They added that new low-cost airline carriers undoubtedly had a *favorable impact on the number of visitors to Kyushu. The number of North American and European tourists visiting the region is *relatively low in comparison to the whole of Japan. As such, officials have stressed the need to raise *awareness about the top sightseeing spots that Kyushu has to offer.

Source: Mainichi Shimbun, July 10, 2017 Apr 19, 2018

*Bureau of Land, Infractructure, Transport and tourism 国土交通省観光局

*consecutive 連続した

*favorable 好調な

*relatively 比較的に

*awareness 意識

2017年に日本を訪れた外国人の数は、前年比19.9%増で過去最高の2977万人を記録しました。安倍政権では2020年の東京オリンピック・パラリンピックの開催後20年の間に外国人観光客を4000万人に増やしたいねらいです。九州に限定すると、九州国土交通省観光局の発表によると2017年7月に九州を訪れた外国人の数は445,277人と、前年同月から2割近く増でした。連続２か月で増加した大きな理由は観光客の増加ですが、それは低コストのLCCの参入が功を奏しているといえます。アメリカやヨーロッパ諸国からの観光客は日本全体からすると比較的少ないですが、自治体がもっと魅力的な観光スポットをアピールしていくことが求められるでしょう。

Harumi Miyahara
Uchiyama FP Office Co,. LTd.