Japan aims for 200,000 yen per capita spending by foreign tourists in 2025

[Image source=Yonhap News]

The Japan Tourism Agency has formulated the 4th Basic Plan for Promoting Tourism Nation (2023?2025), which includes raising the per capita spending of foreign tourists to 200,000 yen (approximately 1.9 million KRW) by 2025 and expanding regional tourism, Kyodo News reported on the 8th.

The agency set the target number of foreign tourists visiting Japan in 2025 to exceed the previous record high of 31.88 million in 2019. It plans to increase the per capita spending of foreign tourists to 200,000 yen in 2025, up 25.8% from 159,000 yen in 2019, before the COVID-19 outbreak.

The goal is also to boost regional tourism by increasing the average length of stay per foreign tourist in regions excluding the three major metropolitan areas of Tokyo, Osaka, and Nagoya from 1.35 nights in 2019 to 1.5 nights in 2025. Through this, the government aims to achieve the annual foreign tourist spending target of 5 trillion yen (approximately 48 trillion KRW) set by Prime Minister Fumio Kishida before 2025. The previous record was 4.8 trillion yen in 2019.

The number of foreign tourists visiting Japan sharply declined from the record high in 2019 to 4.12 million in 2020 and 250,000 in 2021, but increased to 3.83 million last year as quarantine measures were eased. Among foreign visitors to Japan last year, Koreans were the largest group with 1.01 million (26.4%).