In 2001, soon after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the U.S., a friend working at a Tokyo travel agency griped about how terrorism affected his business, saying that tourism, after all, is a "peace industry."
The current slowdown in tourism worldwide shows that the industry is also extremely sensitive to the whims of the economy, particularly the currency markets. Yet it is an industry that Japan is increasingly turning to, to create jobs and to revitalize rural cities and towns.
The turning point for Japan's inbound tourism came in 2003, when the central government launched the Visit Japan Campaign, aiming to boost the number of incoming foreign visitors to 10 million per year by 2010 and 20 million by 2020. The Oct. 1 launch of the Japan Tourism Agency is another sign that Japan, whose outbound tourists have consistently outnumbered those coming in, is finally getting serious about inbound tourism.