Now foraying into the land of the rising sun

Posts : 1 Join date : 2009-10-20

Before developing marketing strategies, it is
better to analyze the tourism statistics for a few years. During the year 1982, there was a downward
trend in tourist arrivals from Japan. It declined by 8.4 percent as against a
nominal increase of 0.2 percent in the previous year. Korea
also registered a decline by 23.6 percent followed by China (18.6 percent) and Hong
Kong (17.6 percent) in 1984.

Except for Japan
which showed an upward trend by 10.9 percent, all other countries showed a
downward trend, led by China
(-19.2 percent), Hong Kong (-11.5 percent) and Korea (-1.9 percent). The percentage change from East Asian
countries during these years is rather significant. During this time, India was passing through great
political and internal problems.

However, East Asia’s
tourist arrivals recorded a positive growth of 7.9 percent in 1984. The credit for that mainly goes to the
Japanese. Remarkably, in 1969, the
traffic from Japan
consisted of about five thousand persons, consisting mostly of business
visitors. Tourism offices of the
government of India in Tokyo have been making concerted efforts to improve the
image of India
as a holiday destination. In
Kerala ayurvedic resorts and hotels also made their own
efforts to promote the country as a health tourism destination in Japan.

In 1969, a limited sample survey conducted
through an advertising agency revealed that the Japanese thought of India as a
country of “Heat, Poverty, Cow and Hunger.”
A well-organized public relations campaign through the media for
educating the Japanese was initiated.
The tourism promotion agencies wanted the Japanese to understand that India is after
all not that much hot, not so far, and not so hungry. Rather it had first class accommodation and
transportation facilities.

This major initiative seems to be giving
results with tourist traffic from Japan touching the 30000 mark
annually. India
as a whole and states like Kerala should try to further exploit this market
since it has a great ‘potential’ mainly due to the fact that Japan is a
Buddhist country.