TokyoTomo Travel Guide

JATA

As part of action plan for the accomplishment of 20 million outbound travelers in 2010, Japan Association of Travel Agents (JATA) is studying the feasibility of boosting travel demand across the nation by selecting target destinations and operating hundreds of charter flights to these places.

The destinations could be 13 countries and areas including the United States, Hawaii, Australia, Canada, United Kingdom, France, China, Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Thailand, Viet Nam, and Cambodia.

In view of the fact that operation of some schedules flights has been suspended or reduced in number and the use of Individual Inclusive Tour Fare (IIT Fare) is not welcomed to airlines, JATA regards charter flights as effective means of increasing seat capacity and creating travel demand locally.

The number of flights to be operated is to be fixed at a later date, but JATA is going to set a target number of visitors for each destination and calculate available seats on scheduled flights, then it will arrive at a desirable number of extra flights to fill the gap. In case of Hawaii, for instance, it does a trial calculation of operating 200 to 300 flights in 2008 in one-way basis count, 400 flights in 2009, and 500 flights in 2010. These flights will be assigned to Haneda Airport as a primal gateway, but due to the slot constraint at Haneda they will eventually be split 50-50 with regional airports.

Aside from charter flights operation, JATA have some agenda on the action programs such as promotional campaigns focusing on specific age groups, a campaign for becoming passport holders, and settlement of oil surcharge issue.

JATA will seek acceleration of deregulation from foreign governments as well as from the Japanese government. As agenda for such, it demands to remove a ceiling of expenses and duration of trip imposed on the school excursion, or to waive visa requirement for the students on bilateral basis. It will also request the Japanese government to make company travel free of taxation, or to contrive incentives for workers who want to take longer vacation, or to further ease the ITC charter rules.

To the foreign governments, it has a mind to talk into eliminating the limit of staying period in the working holiday program or waiving a visa requirement strictly for a sightseeing purpose, especially in India, Russia, and Brazil.

As the schedule for the following months, JATA will announce its action plan in January 2008 and start on a course of action in April.

Source: Travel Vision

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