Only 17% of Japanese people own passports, Foreign Ministry says
The Japanese passport is
According to numbers the Foreign Ministry released last week, around 3.7 million passports were issued domestically in 2024, a 8.8% increase from the year before but down 15.2% from 2019.
The total number of valid passports in the country was around 20.77 million, amounting to around 16.8% of the total population. This is considerably low compared to other countries such as the U.S. and U.K., where those who have passports stands at around 50% and 85% respectively.
Japan has always had a low rate of people with passports compared to other countries, consistently hovering around 22%-24% in the 2010s. But the percentage dropped further during the COVID-19 pandemic and has remained low since.
A Foreign Ministry official in charge of the survey said that although the government is not sure of the exact reason why passport numbers continue to be low in Japan, one reason that is often cited is the weak yen, which has deterred many from traveling or studying abroad.
According to the Japan Association of Travel Agents (JATA), border restrictions that were in place for three years in Japan during the pandemic have further dampened people's desire to travel, especially among younger people.
Earlier this year, JATA President Hiroyuki Takahashi raised concerns that the decline in interest among young people to travel abroad and see other countries may compromise Japan's international competitiveness in the future.
'International exchange is based on mutually beneficial relationships between countries, so the current severe imbalance between inbound and outbound tourism needs to be corrected as soon as possible,' he said.
Although there are some signs of recovery, the number of Japanese students studying abroad remains low compared to prepandemic levels. Only 58,162 college students participated in short- to midterm exchange programs from Japanese universities in the fiscal year through March 2023, according to the most recent numbers from the education ministry-affiliated Japan Student Services Organization. This is only around half the number of those who studied abroad in the fiscal years of 2018 and 2019.
The number of Japanese students of all ages studying abroad for the long term has also continued to fall, with the figure for 2022 only at 41,612, or about half the peak of 82,945 recorded in 2004.
This is in sharp contrast to the rising number of foreign students studying in Japan.
The JATA's Takahashi urged the government to spearhead measures to encourage more young people to have experiences abroad, including measures to provide passports for free to young people traveling overseas for the first time.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
SoraNews24
2 hours ago
- SoraNews24
Fewer Japanese people traveling domestically, government blames birth rate, others blame foreign crowds, costs
Japanese domestic travel numbers have shrunk by more than the population has. On Tuesday, the Cabinet of Japan released its annual tourism white paper, based on data for the 2024 administrative year. The report found that roughly 36.87 million foreign tourists visited Japan last year, a record-setting number. But while Japan's travel destinations are proving more attractive than ever to visitors from overseas, the local population is traveling less. 540 million Japanese residents traveled domestically last year, which is an 8.2-percent drop compared to 2019, the last year before the start of the coronavirus pandemic. The report points to Japan's declining birth rate and contracting population as key reasons for the lowered number, and says that efforts should be made to increase the number of times Japanese people travel domestically and the length of their stays. Among the initiatives aiming to do that is one in the town of Kotohira, Kagawa Prefecture, in which coordinators arrange for travelers spend a portion of their time working in local restaurants or inns to offset the cost of their trip. Another program matches travelers with locals in rural parts of Niigata and Nagano Prefectures for agricultural experiences, giving them a chance to meet locals and work alongside them at their farms, creating interpersonal connections and hopefully encouraging repeat visits to the area once it starts to feel like a second hometown. However, online reactions to the report aren't quite so sure that lowered domestic travel numbers are something that can be pinned entirely on Japan's low birth rate. After all, it's not like the population has shrunk by 8.2 percent since 2019. Instead, online commenters have been pointing to two other reasons they haven't been traveling as much: crowds and costs. Starting with the crowds, the sudden surge in inbound overseas tourists has been dampening domestic travel demand, especially in the country's most famous sightseeing spots. Not that places like Kyoto and Shibuya weren't already crowded with domestic travelers before, but the influx of overseas visitors has raised the congestion to unprecedented levels, and with a growing public perception that some of them have very poor manners, the atmosphere isn't exactly attractive to many Japanese residents. As for costs, a major factor for the inbound tourism boom is the weak yen. Seeing waves of foreign travelers with fat stacks of yen converted from their home-country currencies, hotels have dramatically raised their prices, and so have restaurants and other tourism-related businesses. But while the weak yen means the increased prices are still very palatable to foreign tourists, locals find themselves in the opposite situation. The weak yen and inflationary trends mean that the cost of just about everything (groceries, utilities, clothing, commuter train fares, etc.) has gone up in Japan considerably over the past few years, but without corresponding wage increases for the vast majority of workers. With most Japanese people trying to figure out how to tighten their belts and adjust to having less disposable income, many are balking at the high prices hotels and other travel providers are charging. ▼ Eating the extra costs for hotels and Shinkansen tickets isn't as easy to do when the rice you eat now costs twice as much as it did a year ago. Add it all up, and it's not surprising that, when faced with the prospect of carving more money out of a shrinking household budget to have a less enjoyable vacation, many Japanese people are deciding it's not worth it, as shown by online reactions to the Cabinet's white paper such as: 'Stuff's too expensive, and hotels are way too expensive. Simple as that.' 'I feel like I'm getting ripped off when I travel domestically these days.' 'It's clear that places are raising their prices because they're aiming for foreign tourists.' 'This was inevitable. It's gotten hard to find a place to stay that isn't being affected by inbound overtourism.' 'I already have to ride a crowded train to work every day, so no way am I going to spend my vacation somewhere crowded too.' 'There are a lot of places I'd go if they weren't so jam-packed with foreign tourists.' 'I mean, it's gotten hard to find available hotel rooms, and even when you can, they're so expensive, and the sightseeing spots are so crowded…I only take day trips now.' 'I got no money.' Unfortunately for anyone bothered by inbound tourism-triggered price increases and congestion, the situation has the potential makings of a self-accelerating cycle. If domestic travelers avoid certain hotels or destinations because they're too expensive and crowded with foreign tourists, those businesses will naturally become more reliant on inbound foreign tourists leveraging their currency exchange advantages, which will in turn lead to larger crowds and higher prices, making those places even less attractive to domestic travelers. Finally, it's worth noting that despite the decreased number of domestic Japanese travelers, last year those who did travel domestically spent over 25 trillion yen (US$172 billion), the largest amount on record. With fewer total domestic travelers, though, that means that those who are traveling domestically are spending more per person, suggesting that even domestic travel currently feels like a luxury to many Japanese people, with a growing gap between those in a position to splurge and those whose finances are compelling them to stay home. Source: NHK News Web via Jin, Twitter/@nhk_news Top image: Pakutaso Insert images: Pakutaso (1, 2) ● Want to hear about SoraNews24's latest articles as soon as they're published? Follow us on Facebook and Twitter!
The Mainichi
5 hours ago
- The Mainichi
In Japan, rare bobtail cats are considered good luck. Nagasaki is filled with them
NAGASAKI, Japan (AP) -- In Japan, bobtail cats are considered good luck and Nagasaki is the place to find them. They are known as "omagari neko (bent-tail cats)" or "kagi neko (hook cats)" and have their own society of admirers and even a dedicated Shinto shrine. Their tails come in varieties including hook-shaped at the tip, curved or in a bun, explained Kazuya Hideshima, a worker at Omagari Neko Shrine and member of the Nagasaki Cat Society. Past findings have indicated bobtails accounted for nearly 80% of the cats in Nagasaki, twice the occurrence of anywhere else in Japan. Japanese cats are believed to have come from China in the 6th century with Buddhist monks, serving as rat hunters to protect religious scriptures on ships. Nagasaki bobtails have their roots in the Dutch East Indies when the city was the only foreign port during Japan's closed era in the 17th to 19th centuries. They hunted rats to protect shipments on their way from Southeast Asia to Japan, according to Nagasaki cultural officials. Soshin Yamamoto, a veterinarian and cat specialist, said the large population of bobtails in Nagasaki is likely the result of a genetic mutation that reproduced in a relatively isolated environment when the nation was shut up tight. "Having bobtails is no problem for most cats living a normal life, as long as they live near humans and aren't jumping and running around like wild cats in a forest," he said. Nagasaki residents hope the cats bring in tourists and help business. Natsuno Kani, a 50-year-old tourist from Tokyo who recently visited the bobtail shrine, said she knew Nagasaki was famous for bent-tail cats. But Abigail Tarraso, an artist from Spain based in Takeo City in neighboring Saga prefecture, was unfamiliar with the species, which is not as popular in Spain. "Today is the first time in Nagasaki that I have ever heard of this," said Cindy Bi, an American who is also an artist. "I am excited to look around for them. Maybe we will see a few."
Nikkei Asia
18 hours ago
- Nikkei Asia
Singaporean travel app Traveloka enters Japan market
TOKYO -- Traveloka, one of the leading travel booking apps in Southeast Asia, has launched services in Japan, hoping to expand its share of the growing intra-Asian tourism market. The Singapore-headquartered company, which now operates in eight countries in the region, said that growing numbers of Southeast Asians want to travel to Japan, just as more Japanese people are traveling to Southeast Asia.
