Japan kicked off efforts toward establishing overtourism countermeasures Wednesday, with a meeting of several relevant ministries in Tokyo.
The meeting follows Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s comments to reporters in late August during his travels through Okinawa, stating that addressing issues caused by overtourism, including negative effects felt by local residents, is an “important task for the government.”
Inbound tourism has almost returned to levels seen before the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the Japan Tourism Agency. In July, 2.3 million foreign tourists visited Japan, totaling around 78% of the figures tallied during the same month in 2019.