In previous decades, there weren't as many tourists from China. Japan is rather far away from most of the rest of the developed world, so its international tou

In previous decades, there weren't as many tourists from China. Japan is rather far away from most of the rest of the developed world, so its international tourism industry relies heavily on a handful of neighboring countries. China, Korea, and Taiwan make up 2/3 of all foreign tourists who visit Japan, and almost 3/4 if you count Hong Kong as well [1][2]. The increase in the total number of tourists in the 2010s is more a reflection of how well Japan's neighbors have been doing as it is of Japan's objective attractiveness as a destination. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tourism_in_Japan#Statistics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tourism_in_Japan#Statistics [2] China's share was probably even larger in 2019, as diplomatic disputes with South Korea resulted in a ~60% drop in the number of Korean tourists to Japan in the second half of 2019. This year, of course, the pandemic screwed up everything.