Updated as of November 2005

Million Foreign Visitors, 2007 Goal.

Overseas travelers from and to Japan have increased constantly over the past several decades.

In 1964, the year the Olympic Games took place in Tokyo, the number of Japanese traveling overseas was only 130,000. This number has continued to grow sharply, thanks to revolutionary breakthroughs in mass transportation such as the introduction of the jumbo jet in the 1970s. In 1990, the number topped 10 million, fueled by a sharply appreciated yen in the wake of the 1985 Plaza Accord and the vigorous economic expansion taking place. The speed of growth , however, came to a halt during Japan's now familiar bubble economy that burst in the 1990's.

Since then, the growth trend has gathered momentum and the number of outbound Japanese travelers reached 16.8 million in 2004 after six years of consecutive increases, with the exception of 2003. In 2003, the number of outbound Japanese travelers dropped to 13.2 million because of the negative effect of SARS and the war in Iraq, marking a deep dip.

Japan Airlines, All Nippon Airways and Japan Air System, which merged with JAL in 2002, all serve international routes. In 2004, they carried about 17.7 million passengers in and out of Japan, up 21.3 percent from the year before, and flew a total of roughly 83.2 billion passenger-kilos on their scheduled flights.

The pattern of overseas destinations of the 13.2 million Japanese who traveled abroad in 2003, saw about 7.9 million visit the U.S. mainland, Hawaii, Korea and China, the so-called "Big 4" destinations.

Visitors to the U.S. mainland led with more than 3 million, followed by China with about 2.3 million, Korea with about 1.8 million, and Hawaii with about 0.7 million.

The pattern changed conspicuously in 2004, leaning more toward Asian countries, specifically China, which recorded 2.67 million, and Korea 2 million, while Japanese travelers to the U.S. mainland fell to only 2 million out of a total of 17.7 million travelers.

In the meantime, the number of foreign travelers visiting Japan in 2003 reached 5.2 million. However, Japan ranked only 33rd among the international travelers to major foreign countries. Japan, together with the tourist industry and Japanese government have set a goal of 7 million foreign visitors for 2007.