Number of foreign visitors to Japan likely to hit record 13m per year

The number of foreign visitors to Japan in 2014 is almost certain to exceed 13 million per year, the Japan National Tourism Organization said Wednesday.
According to the government body, the total number of foreign visitors to the country in the January-November period already reached 12.17 million, up 28.2 percent on the year.
In November alone, an estimated 1.17 million foreigners arrived in Japan on sightseeing or business, a record high for the month of November, the tourism bureau said. The figure jumped 39.1 percent from a year earlier, thanks to a weaker yen, the expanded tax free shopping introduced in October and increased large cruise ships, it said.
The number of travelers from Japan's 18 major tourism markets, including China, South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines, Vietnam, India, the US, Canada, France and Germany set all-time highs for the month of November.
The government aims to increase the number of international visitors to 20 million by the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and to 30 million by 2030 to boost Japan's economy.