Tourist flow from Russia to Japan increased by 20.8% in I quarter of 2019

Japan continues to show a significant increase in tourist flow from Russia. In January-March 2019, 23,600 Russians arrived in Japan against 19,542 a year earlier. March month has broken all the records.  
The number of Russians who crossed the border of Japan in March 2019 increased by 31.2% compared to the same period last year and amounted to 11,700 people (against 8,916 people in March 2018), reports the Moscow office of the Japan National Tourist Organization (JNTO) . 
The organization noted that this indicator in March is a record for this month for the entire time of statistics collection. The key factors behind the growth in demand in the first month of spring was not only the beginning of the cherry blossoming season in Japan, but also an increase in air traffic: new flights were launched from cities of the Russian Far East to Japan, and a number of airlines have increased frequency of flights. 
The head of the Moscow representative office of the Japan National Tourist Organization (JNTO), Ms. Airi Motokura, spoke in more details about this trend in her interview. 
According to the latest data from the JNTO, by the rate of growth in tourist traffic in the first quarter, Russia (+ 20.8%) ranks third after Vietnam (+ 42.2%) and Thailand (+ 23.9%) in annual terms. In absolute terms, in January-March 2019 the TOP-3 of outsource countries includes South Korea (2,080,800 people), China (2,169,300 people) and Taiwan (1,189,700 people).