Japan’s travel surplus in 2020 shrank to nearly one-fifth of the previous year, the first drop since the balance turned into the black in 2015, as international travel bans amid the coronavirus pandemic had a huge impact on the number of inbound visitors, government data showed Monday.
The travel balance, which reflects the amount of money foreign visitors spend in Japan versus Japanese spending abroad, tumbled 79.2 percent to 562.1 billion yen ($5.3 billion) from a record 2.70 trillion yen in 2019 since annual comparable data became available in 1996, the Finance Ministry said in a preliminary report.
An arrival lobby for international flights at Kansai International Airport in Osaka Prefecture is deserted amid…