THE earthquake and tsunami that hit northeastern Japan on March 11, and the nuclear crisis that followed, have had an impact on nearly every corner of the economy, perhaps none more directly than the tourist industry. The number of foreign visitors has plunged 50 percent since the triple disasters, according to the Japan National Tourism Organization.
But four months on, travelers are trickling back. Most are business travelers, adventure seekers and bargain hunters, a type of visitor not often associated with Japan, where a sushi dinner can wipe out a week's savings.
The view of Japan as a high-priced playground is what kept Erin Conroy and Jenny McMeans, friends from New York City, from visiting. But this spring, they found round-trip tickets to Tokyo on airfarewatchdog.com for just $600, about half what they normally cost, and booked a room in a hostel for 2,600 yen (about $33 at 79 yen to the dollar) a night. Suddenly, Japan was affordable, even with the yen near record highs against the dollar.
"We felt like, in many ways, Tokyo was on our too-good-to-be-true list," said Ms. Conroy, who was walking with Ms. McMeans around Tsukiji, home to the world's biggest wholesale fish market, one recent Saturday.
And what about the danger of radiation? Ms. Conroy and Ms. McMeans said they perused travel advisories and were convinced that they would not be exposed to high levels of radiation. "My parents were more worried than we were," Ms. Conroy said.
Travelers seem to be gauging the safety of visiting Japan in different ways. Some rely on blogs that have posts written by foreigners living in Japan or frequent travelers to the country. Many, like Ms. Conroy and Ms. McMeans, turn to government advisories. The State Department says that "while the situation at the Fukushima Daiichi plant remains serious and dynamic, the health and safety risks to land areas which are outside a 50-mile radius of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant are low." In Britain, the Foreign Office advises against travel to the parts of northeastern Japan hit by the earthquake and tsunami, and to within 37 miles of the reactors in Fukushima. But "the situation in Japan outside of these specific areas has largely returned to normal and most visits are trouble free," the office said.
Some visitors said that if the risks were truly great, governments would advise against traveling to Japan, which has not been the case. "I felt I had to do my own homework because the Japanese have a stiff upper lip about these things," said Jack Jaffe, who last month visited Tokyo on business from Los Angeles, where he works for a Japanese electronics company. "But I checked the U.K. and U.S. Web sites and both essentially said the same thing: That outside the zone near the reactors, things are O.K."
Still, skepticism remains about the Japanese government's handling of the crisis, including its ability to monitor radiation levels in the air, soil and water. The government has lifted many of the bans on the sale of milk and some vegetables, but abnormal levels of radiation have been found in green tea leaves grown in Shizuoka, and some contaminated beef recently found its way into restaurants and shops. But these are largely viewed as isolated instances. In its fact sheet on food and water safety in Japan, the American embassy in Tokyo states that "the Government of Japan is taking appropriate steps to ensure the safety of the food and water supply."
Given the doubts, the decision to visit has turned into a proxy of sorts on how the rest of the world views Japan. For some would-be visitors, no amount of reassurances or discount airfares could persuade them to visit now.
"We've had two aftershocks in the last couple of weeks, and I get e-mails from clients almost immediately asking if it's safe to visit," said Daniel Simon, the general manager of the Four Seasons Hotel Tokyo at Marunouchi, where bookings are down 50 percent. Mr. Simon said he tells customers that Tokyo has some of the most earthquake resistant buildings in the world and that the city is far from the reactors in Fukushima. But "we don't really think the high-end leisure traveler will come back until Chinese New Year 2012 because there's still too much negative news in the media about Japan."
Fears are so pervasive that arrivals at the Kansai International Airport in Osaka, 360 miles from Fukushima, fell 47 percent in May. "I've been asked half a dozen times whether I'm afraid of the radiation," said Ed Kornhauser, a pianist from San Diego who has traveled from Osaka to Okinawa since May. "A lot of hostel owners tell me tourism is way down. They want to know why foreigners aren't coming."
Mr. Kornhauser said he felt comfortable visiting Japan because he knew he would be far from Fukushima. Despite the fears expressed by his friends, he was reassured after reading the State Department's Web site. "After the earthquake, I didn't think twice," he said. "My friends blew it out of proportion. This is a fairly big country."
But confidence can be fragile when it involves radiation. So hotels, including high-end places like the Okura and the Imperial in Tokyo, have tried to entice visitors with discounts of up to 50 percent. Deals also abound for tours, which has helped lure back visitors from Hong Kong and other places in Asia. "It's less crowded now, and package tour prices are down 20 to 50 percent," said Masaki Hirata, the executive director of marketing and promotion at the Japan National Tourism Organization.
Some hoteliers are attempting to directly reassure customers that their inns are far from trouble. Kisaburo Minato, who runs the Kimi Ryokan in Tokyo, recently wrote on his inn's Web site that "the emergency at Fukushima is being exaggerated in the foreign press" and that except in the area near the reactors, "life goes on as normal."
Indeed, little has changed in Tokyo, except for the energy conservation measures that include turning up thermostats on air-conditioners. In Sendai, the closest big city to the earthquake's epicenter, restaurants, hotels and shops downtown are open for business. It is only when visitors go to the neighborhoods within a couple of miles of the Pacific Ocean that they see the impact of the tsunami.
Still, many tourists are erring on the side of caution, said Ellie Colin, who handles corporate and leisure travel at the Ovation Travel Group in New York. One client, she said, canceled a $62,000 trip.
"The headlines were really bleak and every single day they got more and more nervous," said Ms. Colin, who has not booked any leisure trips to Japan since. "My feeling is that it's going to take until next year and some really good P.R. out of Japan before leisure travelers return."
First published on July 31, 2011 at 12:00 am
Source: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/11212/1164257-37-0.stm?cmpid=lifestyle.xml
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