Japan's tourism is booming but staff shortage threatens to derail 2030 goal
The booming Japanese
tourism sector may face a severe challenge in the years ahead to sustain its growth due to a shortfall of more than 500,000 workers by 2030, according to a report by a local think tank.
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Industry insiders noted that 2030 was the official target year for
Japan to receive 60 million inbound travellers, and the critical staff shortage could tarnish the nation's reputation for omotenashi – the traditional Japanese commitment to look after the needs of guests.
'We are already seeing a shortage of people in the industry, most definitely,' said Masaru Takayama, president of Kyoto-based Spirit of Japan Travel, an inbound travel agency.
According to a report by the Kansai-based Asia Pacific Institute of Research released earlier this month, the Japanese tourism sector will face a staffing gap of about 536,000 workers by 2030.
Takayama told This Week in Asia: 'A lot of companies in the travel sector had to lay off staff during the pandemic, and those people found jobs in different sectors. Now that tourism is up and running again – and busier than ever – we have lost those people to new careers, and we have lost their skills and knowledge.'
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He pointed out that the staff shortage was particularly acute in rural parts of Japan.
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Asia Times
13 hours ago
- Asia Times
The woman quietly leading a BRICS bank revolution
Former Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff is nearing the end of her first term as head of the New Development Bank (NDB), also known as the BRICS Bank, which is set to conclude in July. She has been re-elected for another two-year term, while Brazil will take over the BRICS presidency later this year. Appointed in early 2023, Rousseff's presidency of the Shanghai-based NDB has been groundbreaking in many respects. She was not only the first woman to lead the NDB but also the first former head of state to hold the position. As one of the bank's original architects – she helped found the NDB in 2014 during her presidency of Brazil – Rousseff viewed the institution as a tool to challenge Western dominance in development finance. She initially expressed a desire to boost investment in environmental projects and to circumvent the 'geopolitical impact of Western retaliations against Russia.' In addition, she made clear that NDB financing would come 'without imposing conditionalities' on borrower nations, a direct contrast to traditional Western-led institutions. The idea was that developing countries should have access to funds without the political or austerity strings often attached by the likes of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) or World Bank. Rousseff has made local currency lending central to her agenda, aiming for 30% of NDB loans in members' own currencies by 2026, reducing dependence on the US dollar and sidestepping the risks of Western sanctions in the process. By late 2023, Rousseff touted a pipeline of 76 new projects worth US$18.2 billion for 2023-24, on top of the 98 projects worth $33 billion the NDB had reportedly already financed. Her tenure kicked off with a symbolic visit from Brazil's President Lula in Shanghai in April 2023, where Lula attended her inauguration ceremony. At the ceremony, Lula praised the NDB as a partnership of emerging nations 'very different from traditional banks dominated by developed countries,' and expressed high hopes that it could help create a world with less poverty and inequality under Rousseff's watch. Her presence at the G20, alongside leaders of the world's largest economies, signaled the NDB's growing profile on the global stage. Earlier in 2024, Rousseff had even traveled to Russia to attend the St Petersburg International Economic Forum, where de-dollarization and alternative financial architectures were key themes. Rousseff has not shied away from using her political stature to give the NDB a seat at tables traditionally dominated by Western-led institutions. She has signaled to members and prospective members alike that the NDB under her leadership is open for business. Brazil was a key testing case for the NDB's rising emergency finance efforts. In May 2024, following devastating storms and floods in southern Brazil, she announced that the NDB would extend an aid package of $1.1 billion to rebuild infrastructure in Rio Grande do Sul state. The funding, coordinated in partnership with Brazilian public banks, was earmarked for everything from small business recovery to new roads, bridges and sanitation systems in the disaster-hit areas. Such a rapid mobilization of over a billion US dollars was unprecedented for the NDB in response to a member's natural disaster. Under her leadership, the NDB has aligned closely with China's priorities, reflecting the NDB's utility as a tool for China to use international institutions to achieve revisionist goals. During Rousseff's first weeks in Shanghai, Brazil and China reached an agreement to set up a clearinghouse to conduct trade in Chinese yuan and Brazilian reals, thereby reducing their dollar dependence. In May 2025, the People's Bank of China and Brazil's Central Bank signed a renewed local-currency swap agreement worth 190 billion yuan, about $27.7 billion, valid for five years and extendable. In 2024 and so far in 2025, China-Brazil trade has increased by about 10% year to year, with Rousseff being instrumental in China-Brazil dealings. Lula's government has treated the NDB as an extension of its strategic partnership with China, a venue through which Chinese capital can more safely flow into Brazilian projects under multilateral cover. By steering the bank to focus on local-currency lending and alternative payment systems, Rousseff indirectly aided Moscow's goal of a financial safety net outside of the US's reach. However, Russian entities themselves have not received new NDB loans since the Ukraine war began. India and South Africa, for their part, benefited from the continuation of multi-billion-dollar NDB funding for infrastructure, transportation and renewable energy projects but saw no obvious special boost under Rousseff compared to prior NDB leadership. If anything, some Indian analysts quietly fretted that the Rousseff-led bank became too closely aligned with China and Brazil's political understanding, potentially at India's expense, a reflection of India's wariness of overt anti-West posturing by BRICS. Perhaps the biggest new entrant on Rousseff's watch was Indonesia (also a G20 member), which, according to BRICS officials, was approved for NDB membership by early 2025. Rousseff has actively promoted this expansion, seeing it as part of her legacy of making the NDB 'a bank of the Global South' in substance. Still, Rousseff's appointment was polarizing from the start. Critics in Brazil's right-wing opposition accused Lula of provoking the US and aligning too closely with autocracies, while her 2016 impeachment and praise of China's governance model made her a controversial figure abroad. Externally, Rousseff had to manage the fallout from Russia's war in Ukraine, which forced the NDB to suspend Russian loans to maintain compliance with global markets. This geopolitical balancing act, along with rising interest rates, constrained the bank's ability to expand lending. Nonetheless, the NDB preserved its AA+ rating from S&P Global, even as Rousseff faced pressure to prove that an emerging-market-led bank could operate with high standards under global scrutiny. Rousseff was originally expected to step down in July 2025, with Russia set to nominate her successor as part of BRICS' rotating presidency system. But due to sanctions and geopolitical constraints, which could have potentially tanked the BRICS' prospects and more neutral image as a viable international bloc, Moscow backed her continuation. In March 2025, the NDB's Board of Governors unanimously reappointed Rousseff for a second term. Rousseff has redefined the NDB's presidency and helped elevate the bank as a key lever in China and the Global South's revisionist goals against Western financial dominance. Under her leadership, the NDB has deepened alignment with Beijing's broader strategy of building alternative global governance institutions, ones that reflect multipolarity and reduce dependence on the US-led financial institutions. Rousseff's enthusiastic support for de-dollarization, promotion of yuan- and real-denominated lending, and facilitation of Chinese-backed infrastructure in Latin America, particularly in Brazil, positioned the NDB as a complement to China's Belt and Road Initiative in a post-Pax Americana order. Looking ahead, Rousseff will likely stay focused on infrastructure, sustainability and social inclusion, though with perhaps sharper priorities. She reportedly plans to accelerate de-dollarization by expanding local currency lending, supporting tools like BRICS swap lines and digital payments. By any measure, these plans represent a seismic shift in development finance. Membership expansion is also likely, with countries like Saudi Arabia and Argentina in focus, along with deeper ties to regional banks like the Development Bank of Latin America and the Caribbean (CAF) and the African Development Bank. But her second term will also test her ability to manage global financial volatility and protect the bank's stability amid rising debt and geopolitical uncertainty. To date, and not without criticism, Rousseff has been instrumental in positioning the NDB as a challenger to Western financial hegemony, offering real competition and choice to countries in the Global South previously subjugated by an often oppressive world lending system. And with that helped to usher in a quiet but consequential revolution in the international order. Joseph Bouchard is a journalist and researcher from Québec covering security and geopolitics in Latin America. His articles have appeared in Reason, The Diplomat, The National Interest, Le Devoir and RealClearPolitics. He is an incoming PhD student in politics at the University of Virginia and SSHRC doctoral fellow on Latin American politics.
Asia Times
2 days ago
- Asia Times
Chinese state-owned airlines join price war in national mission
Chinese state-owned airlines have joined an intensifying price war, although unwillingly, amid challenges including local passengers' weakening spending power and rising market competition. Air China, Southern Airlines and Eastern Airlines have been facing huge losses for five years since the Covid-19 pandemic broke out in early 2020. Although China canceled all epidemic rules in early 2023, the three firms still recorded net losses in the past two years. They carried more passengers last year than in 2023, but had to lower air ticket prices due to rising competition from budget airlines and China State Railway Group, the country's high-speed train operator. The price war is intensifying this year. Many Chinese airlines now offer domestic round-trip tickets at about 200 to 300 yuan (US$28 to US$42), as it is a low season before the summer holidays. Round-trip tickets to remote cities are 80- 90% off, while those to key cities like Beijing are 40-50% off. Budget airlines such as Spring Airlines and Juneyao Air are growing fast in this price war. a unit of the People's Daily, reported in late May that Chinese airlines have started offering significant discounts to customers. For example, a ticket for a round trip between Chengdu and Kunming costs only 222 yuan, and between Chengdu and Haikou, it costs 237 yuan. Kunming and Haikou are famous for their natural attractions. A Chongqing-based writer said air tickets departing from Chengdu are about 70% off on average from the high season. He said a Beijing-Sanya round trip ticket is only 230 yuan, down from 2,000 yuan during the Spring Festival in late January. He said the competition intensifies as Chinese airlines keep opening new routes this year. Citing Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) data, Xinhua reported in March that 38 airlines will open 640 new domestic flight routes this year, connecting key cities such as Chongqing, Changsha and Tianjin with tourism cities in Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia, Guizhou, Sichuan and Yunnan provinces. The CAAC also allowed 193 local and foreign airlines to add 22,946 new international passenger and cargo flights per week in 2025, or 33% more than in the same period last year. These new routes cover 78 foreign countries, 57 along the Belt and Road. 'Do you think the three state-owned airlines don't want to make a profit?' a Shandong-based columnist called Xiao Song says in an article. 'They have their difficulties.' 'Despite losing money, some routes had to be launched for political reasons, such as those to Xinjiang and Tibet, and those to African and South American countries,' he said. He added that budget airlines and state-owned airlines operate their businesses differently. For example: Spring Airlines targets low-cost tourists who travel to remote cities, while state-owned airlines mainly compete in key cities. Juneyao Airlines offers one-day trips for businesspeople at prices lower than those of the high-speed railway. Budget airlines mainly use Airbus A320, which can fly up to 12 hours per day, compared with state-owned airlines' 10 hours. State-owned airlines deploy domestically some of their long-range Boeing 787 planes, which burn more fuel than narrow-body aircraft. State-owned airlines operate less efficiently than private firms. He said these are reasons why budget airlines can make a profit and pay their pilots 15,000 yuan per 90 flight hours, while state-owned airlines lose money and can only offer their pilots 10,000 yuan. He said state-owned airlines now realize these problems and try to provide more low-cost packages. In 2024, the top seven Chinese airlines, including state-owned and private ones, recorded combined revenues of 587 billion yuan, up 13.6%. Spring Airlines was the most profitable, with a net profit of 2.27 billion yuan. In fact, Air China, Eastern Airlines, and Southern Airlines successfully narrowed their net or before-tax losses last year from 2023. The number of passengers carried was 155 million (+23.8%) for Air China, 141 million (+21.6%) for Eastern Airlines, and 165 million (+16%) for Southern Airlines. According to the CAAC, the total number of flight passengers grew 5.8% to 246.8 million in the first four months of 2025 compared with last year. Currently, the central government does not intend to stop the price war or reduce competition in the airline industry. 'The decline in air ticket prices is good news for the tourism market as it can effectively boost the number of tourists and create growth for related industries such as hotels, catering, transportation and retail,' a Yunnan-based writer says in an article. She thinks the trend will also help diversify the tourism market, as new and small tourism sites can emerge. However, Hsieh Chin-ho, a Taiwanese commentator, said the falling prices of air tickets and hotels will worsen China's deflationary problem, which was caused by the burst of the country's property bubbles several years ago. Hsieh said China's consumer price index (CPI) decreased by 0.1% year-on-year in May, and its producer price index (PPI) dropped by 3.3% year-on-year, showing weak domestic consumption. He said a vicious cycle created by weakening consumption and falling property prices could further drag down the Chinese economy – resulting in a lost decade of slow or negative GDP growth, such as was experienced by Japan from the 1990s to the 2010s. Read: China's fast-growing high-speed railway network faces reality
HKFP
2 days ago
- HKFP
Meta sues Hong Kong-based company behind AI deepfake app that creates fake nude images
US social media giant Meta has sued the Hong Kong-based company behind an app that uses artificial intelligence to create fake nude images of people without their consent, seeking to stop the firm from advertising the app on Meta platforms. Meta said last Thursday that it had filed the complaint against Joy Timeline HK Limited, the maker of the CrushAI app, amid what it called a 'concerning growth of so-called 'nudify' apps online.' Joy Timeline HK Limited allegedly violated Meta's rules by running CrushAI ads with at least 170 business accounts it created on Meta-owned Facebook and Instagram, CNN said citing the complaint filed to the District Court. Some of the ads included AI-generated nude or sexually explicit images with captions such as 'upload a photo to strip for a minute' and 'erase any clothes on girls,' according to CNN. Now, the tech giant is seeking an injunction to restrain the Hong Kong firm 'from creating, sharing, publishing, disseminating or contributing to the publication' of such advertisements on its platforms, media outlets reported. The order would target any content relating to apps designed to generate AI or deepfake images containing nudity or NCII [non-consensual intimate image sharing] elements. The tech giant is also seeking to claim back the US$289,200 (HK$2.28 million) it said it spent to take down, monitor, and investigate the ads that the Hong Kong company had allegedly bought since September 2023, The Witness reported. Meta said in a statement last week that its lawsuit 'follows multiple attempts by Joy Timeline HK Limited to circumvent Meta's ad review process and continue placing these ads, after they were repeatedly removed for breaking our rules.' 'This legal action underscores both the seriousness with which we take this abuse and our commitment to doing all we can to protect our community from it,' it said. Per its policies, Meta removes ads and Facebook and Instagram pages promoting so-called 'nudify' apps, blocks links on its platforms, and restricts related search terms so that AI-generated non-consensual sexually explicit images are not circulated, it added in its statement. Meta said its lawsuit is part of broader action against these apps. 'We're building new technology to detect ads for nudify apps and sharing signals about these apps with other tech companies so they can take action too,' it said. LATEST FROM HKFP 3 Hong Kong universities move up in QS top 50 rankings, with HKU jumping to 11th place Beijing official praises Hong Kong leader for 'positive progress' in boosting economy, improving people's livelihoods Blanket measure to halt imported labour schemes when unemployment hits 'red line' is 'inappropriate,' minister says Hong Kong doctor to be sentenced in July for issuing over 6,600 false Covid-19 vaccine exemptions
