Japan wanted fewer tourists. Now a diplomatic row is doing the job
The once-reliable stream of high-spending visitors to the Land of the Rising Sun is drying up... or so it seems
Chris Leadbeater
25 November 2025 1:00pm GMT

Had you been in Tokyo last week, you would not have noticed any obvious fretting over a diplomatic spat. The ebb and flow of people across the zebra stripes of the famous Shibuya Crossing – rumoured to be the busiest pedestrian intersection in the world – was as tidal as ever. Restaurants were filled with diners along the Ginza Corridor – and autumn was still on fiery form in the grounds around the Imperial Palace.

But it was there all the same: a widening war of words with neighbouring China that earned mention in broadsheet headlines, on social media feeds and in TV news bulletins.

The flashpoint for this stand-off, as it often is in the region, is Taiwan – the self-governing island which China considers to be its own territory. But specifically, the row has been triggered by a statement made by the Japanese prime minister Sanae Takaichi, a hawkish politician whose general outlook might easily be summarised as “Japan First”.

On November 7, she suggested that any Chinese attack on Taiwan should be viewed as a “situation threatening Japan’s survival”; a tacit suggestion that this scenario would precipitate an intervention by Japanese troops.

The response from Beijing – forever prickly about its own sphere of influence – has been furious. Amid repeated demands (so far ignored) for Takaichi to retract her comments, China has urged its students to think carefully about whether they should study in Japan. On November 17, Chinese distributors suspended screenings of two new Japanese films.

Most seismic, however, has been the instruction to Chinese tourists. On November 14, Beijing urged its travelling public not to visit Japan. Within 24 hours, three Chinese airlines had begun offering refunds on bookings to Japanese cities. A week later, the number of Chinese carriers taking the same stance had reached double figures.

What is fast becoming a crisis has the potential to be extremely expensive. Even as the planet’s fourth-largest economy, Japan will feel the financial pain that this falling-out is now costing tour operators, hotels and other travel-related businesses. Tourism is worth $237bn (£181bn) a year to the Japanese economy, with total tourism consumption accounting for about six per cent of GDP. China is by far the largest demographic within that figure: around one in every five tourists in Japan is Chinese.

Already, scare stories are emerging. On November 19, East Japan International Travel Service – a Tokyo-based tour operator that focuses on group itineraries for the Chinese market – reported that 80 per cent of its bookings for the rest of the year had evaporated. The Nomura Research Institute, one of Japan’s main financial analysis firms, predicts that if the boycott lasts 12 months, it will amount to a deficit of 2.2tn yen (£10.7bn).

Others are more ambivalent about the cold-shouldering. Speaking to Telegraph Travel last week, Serge Roso, a Dutch-born tour guide who lives and works in the southerly city of Nagoya, says the likely economic impact of the crisis has been exaggerated.

“It’s not as big a problem as you think,” he explains. “Most of the Chinese tour groups which come to Japan are served by Chinese tour operators. The Chinese market largely keeps the work for itself. Yes, there are Japanese businesses that will be affected – the high-end fashion stores where Chinese tourists love to shop will probably see a dent. In Kyoto, anyway; Kyoto will be less busy. But in Nagoya, it won’t make much difference.”

His words are echoed by Junko Shinoda, a guide in the north-coast city of Kanazawa. “The situation doesn’t worry me,” she says. “Chinese tourists tend to spend their money in Chinese-owned restaurants. Of course, some hotels rely on Chinese tourists, and those people are worried. But in Kanazawa, most of the tourists are westerners anyway.”

A solution to Japan’s ‘popularity problem’?

The situation is unfortunate but will probably be of only minor relevance to British travellers, says James Mundy of Bristol-based tour specialist Inside Japan.

“Obviously, we hope that the relationship between the two countries does not deteriorate any further,” he says, “but in terms of visitors to Japan from the UK, we don’t believe that this will have any significant impact. On the contrary, there have been rising issues with overtourism in specific Japanese places – such as Kyoto. So a temporary reduction in international visitor numbers may actually be beneficial from an experience perspective.”

On this last point, the data is clear. Japan is in the grip of a “popularity problem” that has started to cause concern among its citizens. The growth in interest in the country over the past decade has been remarkable. In 2014, the country attracted 13.4 million international visitors. By last year, that figure had almost tripled, to 36.9 million – a new tourism record.



Yet this “success” is increasingly unsustainable. There have been local complaints about the pressure on the transport system – and about visitor behaviour. A nation of famously polite societal norms, the Japanese have become frustrated with the side-effects of mass tourism; graffiti, litter, the sight of tourists eating in the street (which is considered rude).

You don’t have to look hard for signs of this annoyance. In July, the government set up an official body to investigate the issue of overtourism, with the then prime minister, Shigeru Ishiba, acknowledging that “disorderly conduct by some foreigners has created a situation in which the public feels uneasy and cheated.”

Takaichi tapped into this sentiment just after her election as Japan’s first female prime minister, on October 21. Responding to reports that a tourist had kicked one of the deer that live around the temples in Nara – animals widely deemed to be sacred – she declared that “if visitors come from abroad, and they intentionally harm what Japanese people cherish, something has gone too far.”

In opening a gulf with China, the prime minister may have “found” a temporary solution to Japan’s overtourism worries.

Whether the country takes more formal steps down this path (the mayor of Kyoto, for example, has been mooting two-tier pricing on buses, with foreigners charged more) will perhaps become clearer when the spring cherry-blossom season brings Instagram gawpers in their droves – whether from China or further afield.

Source: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/destinat...t-japan-travel/