Japan to allow non-guided group tours from September

Japan had 353,119 foreign visitors last year, a far cry from the record 31.9 million in 2019. - Bloomberg

TOKYO (Bloomberg): Japan will allow non-guided package tours from all countries from Sept 7 and more than double the number of people it permits to enter daily as it further rolls back some of strictest Covid-19 border controls among major economies.

The moves announced Wednesday (Aug 31) by Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, however, do not allow for entry of individual tourists. The premier also didn’t lay out any changes for visa restrictions that place a high bar for entering the country.