According to statistics released by the Kyushu District Transport Bureau on Aug. 10, the number of foreign visitors entering the island between January and June jumped 41% year-on-year to an estimated 971,081. When the 98,000 cruise ship passengers (through May) are added to this number, the overall total comes to 1.06 million, marking the first time that more than one million foreign tourists have visited Kyushu in a given half year. The weak yen and the expansion of duty-free product categories appear to have contributed significantly to the uptick. On a per-country/region basis, 502,000 (+44.7% y-o-y) of the tourists hailed from Korea, 109,000 (+18.7% y-o-y) from Taiwan, and 78,000 (+69.5% y-o-y) from China. Meanwhile, visitors from Thailand doubled to 28,000 thanks to new low cost air routes. Source: Nishinippon Shimbun 8/11
(Photo: provided by the City of Fukuoka)
