2016.04.23
Number of visitors in 2015 mark new record
The Okinawa Prefecture Department of Culture, Tourism and Sports have announced official numbers of visitors to the prefecture.
According to the figures, a total of 7,936,300 people visited the prefecture during 2015 setting a new record for both domestic and foreign tourists. It’s also a new record for the third consecutive year.
Especially the number of foreign tourists increased much. Officials cite several reasons for the surge, including devalued yen, expansion of airlines connecting Naha to overseas cities, and the increased number of cruise ships making port calls at Naha and other cities in the prefecture.
Then total number increased 10.7 % from the year before. 79% of the total were domestic tourists who counted for 6,266,000 visitors that is an increase of 1.3% over the previous year. On the other hand, foreign tourists counted 21% of the total or 1,674,300, which is a whopping 69.4% increase from 2014.
The highest number of overseas tourists came from Taiwan that accounted for 30.2%, second was China with 21.2%, the 3rd was Korea 19.9% and Hong Kong with 12.0% was on the fourth place.
Okinawa Prefecture tourism officials have set up the goal of 8,400,000 visitors for the next year, with 6,400,000 of them domestic visitors and 2,000,000 coming from overseas.