Japan reopens to tourists, but souvenir shops are closed and there aren’t enough hotel workers. 

TOKYO – This week, Japan is opening its doors to tourists again after being closed off for more than two years because of the pandemic. However, hopes for a tourism boom are being hampered by shops that are closed and a lack of people who work in the hospitality industry.

On Tuesday, Japan will let people travel to dozens of countries without a visa again. This will end some of the world’s strictest border controls, which were put in place to stop the spread of COVID-19. Prime Minister Fumio Kishida hopes that tourism will help boost the economy and make up for the fact that the yen is at its lowest level in 24 years.

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Arata Sawa is one of the people who wants foreign tourists to come back to his traditional inn. Before, up to 90% of his guests were from outside of Japan.

Sawa is the third-generation owner of the Sawanoya Ryokan in Tokyo. He said, “I hope and expect that a lot of foreigners will come to Japan, just like they did before COVID.”

So far in 2022, just over half a million people have come to Japan. In 2019, a record 31.8 million people came to Japan. Prior to the coronavirus, the government’s target population was 40 million by the Summer Olympics in 2020.

Last week, Kishida said that the government wants to get 5 trillion yen ($34.5 billion) from tourists every year. But that goal might be too high for an area that has gotten worse since the pandemic. Government data show that hotel jobs fell by 22% between 2019 and 2021.

In a report, Takahide Kiuchi of the Nomura Research Institute said that spending by foreign tourists will only reach 2.1 trillion yen by 2023 and won’t be higher than it was before COVID until 2025.

The president of Japan Airlines, Yuji Akasaka, told the Nikkei newspaper last week that inbound bookings have tripled since the announcement that the border will be opened up. Even so, he said, international travel won’t be fully back to normal until about 2025.

HAUNTED TOWN

Narita Airport, which is 70 kilometres from Tokyo and is Japan’s biggest international airport, is still very quiet, with about half of its 260 shops and restaurants closed.

Maria Satherley, 70, from New Zealand, pointed to the Terminal 1 departure area and said, “It looks like half a ghost town.”

Satherley’s son lives on the northern island of Hokkaido. She would like to go back to Japan this winter with her granddaughter, but she probably won’t because the child is too young to be vaccinated, which is a requirement for entering Japan.

She said, “We’ll just wait until next year.”

Sawato Shindo, the president of Amina Collection Co., said that the company has closed its three souvenir shops at Narita and is not likely to reopen them until spring next year.

During the pandemic, the company moved staff and supplies from the airport to other locations in its 120-shop chain around Japan. This was done so that it could focus on domestic tourism.

Shindo said, “I don’t think there will be a sudden return to the way things were before the pandemic.” “Compared to other countries, the rules are still pretty strict.”

People in Japan are still strongly told to wear masks inside and not talk too loudly. On Friday, the Cabinet agreed to change the rules so that hotels can turn away guests who don’t follow infection control rules during an outbreak.

In the past two years, many service workers have found better jobs and higher pay in other fields. It may be hard to get them back, said a consultant for tourism companies who asked not to be named.

Related: Japan spent nearly $20 billion on yen intervention, a record amount.

“The hospitality industry is known for its low wages, so if the government wants tourism to be a key industry, it’s likely going to need financial help or subsidies,” he said.

This month, the Japanese government will start a domestic travel programme that gives discounts on transportation and lodging. This is similar to its Go To Travel campaign in 2020, which was cut short because of a rise in COVID infections.

tight market for workers

Teikoku Databank, a market research company, found that almost 73% of hotels in Japan said they were short of regular workers in August. This is up from about 27% a year earlier.

A trade group worker who asked not to be named said that inns in Kawaguchiko, a lake town at the base of Mt. Fuji, had trouble finding workers before the pandemic because of Japan’s tight labour market, and they expect the same problem now.

Akihisa Inaba, the general manager of the hot springs resort Yokikan in Shizuoka, central Japan, said the same thing. He said that during the summer, there wasn’t enough staff, so workers had to work instead of taking time off.

“Of course, the labour shortage will get worse when tourists start coming back,” said Inaba. “So, I’m not sure we should be too happy.”

Another worry is whether people from outside of Japan wear face masks and follow other common rules to avoid getting sick. During most of the pandemic, people liked the strict border controls, and they still worry that new viral strains will appear.

Sawa, who runs an inn in Tokyo, said, “From the start of the pandemic until now, we’ve only had a few foreign guests.” “Most of them wore masks, but I’m not sure if people who come here in the future will do the same.”

“I’m going to ask them nicely to wear a mask inside the building,” he said.

($1 = 145.0100 yen)