A tourist from Hong Kong (right) talks to a Chinese-Japanese woman living in Japan (left) and her Chinese sister living in London (center) as they were visiting Sensoji Buddhist temple in Tokyo on Jan 13, 2023. Visitors to Japan surged to a post-COVID high in March, official data showed on April 19, 2023. (PHOTO / AP)
TOKYO – Visitors to Japan surged to a post-COVID high in March, official data showed on Wednesday, as many international tourists flocked to see the nation's famous cherry blossoms for the first time in four years as travel curbs were gradually lifted.
The number of foreign visitors for business and leisure totaled 1.82 million in March, compared to 1.48 million in February, according to the Japan National Tourism Organisation.
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Arrivals were still down 34 percent from March 2019, before pandemic travel curbs that were instituted from the following year.