*JATA Chairman determines to step to the next strategy beyond 20 million overseas travelers

JATA World Tourism Congress 2006 was held with a discussion theme of "Branding in Tourism" in Tokyo on September 21, joined by Minister of Land, Infrastructure and Transport Kazuo Kitagawa and 960 tourism-related attendants from both Japan and the world. JATA Chairman Koji Shinmachi said at opening remarks, "The government's leading tourism country policy is not only for development of the tourism industry but also for growth of the whole industry of Japan. Now the tourism industry plays an important part of the economic activities in Japan, including local developments, and also plays a diplomatic role."

This Week Headline
*JATA Chairman determines to step tothe next strategy beyond 20 million overseas travelers
*JAL PAK President hopes to double overseas travelers to 36 million
*From "SeeAmerica" to "DiscoverAmerica" for more active promotions
*Aeromexico begins serving Narita-Mexico City flight
*Continental CEO emphasizes Asian market for further business growth
*JAL and ANA increase China flights according to the new agreement
*JAL and KAL expand code share flight network
*NAA finally began extending the B runway to 2,500 meters

*JAL and ANA each will be able to use new 34 slots and 36 slots at Narita

Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport has decided to allot 70 slotsa week (35 return flights a week) out of unused 140 slots a week (70 return flights a week) to Japanese airlines. The Ministry has agreed with the Chinese counterpart to take advantage of unused slots for domestic flights for international flights including those by Chinese airlines.

This Week Headline
*JAL and ANA each will be able to use new 34 slots and 36 slots at Narita
*Airlines enjoy higher business class demands on their Guam flights
*Direct charter flights for Switzerland will be served from local cities of Japan next summer
*Korea visitors to Japan are expected to reach 2 million this year
*The Ministry approves the Narita runway extension project
*Kansai suffers from fewer flights by Japanese carriers than before
*Narita handled the most passengers ever this summer
*JAL air transport result for July 2006

*Japanese visitors to Asia Pacific varied by country in July

The number of Japanese visitors to China for July this year still grew by 16.5% to 310,000 over the same month last year due to positive rebound from the reductions after the anti-Japan demonstration in April last year. On the contrary, the number of those to Korea turned into4.2% reduction to 173,272 for July this year although the monthly number had marked double-digit growth since May this year. For the first seven months of this year, China accepted 8.0% more Japanese visitors than a year ago, while Korea suffered from 4.5% reduction of Japanese visitors.

This Week Headline
*Japanese visitors to Asia Pacific varied by country in July
*JATA will report "Post-20 million Overseas TravelersPlan" in October this year
*Fiji will run a joint tourism campaign for the Japanese market
*NWA will add its Narita-Guam/Saipan flights from October
*KAL will fly into new Shizuoka Airport
*Extension of Narita runway is finally accepted by local communities
*Centrair resulted in 10% reduction of passengers for July
*Sojitz ties up with DLH for business aircraft charter services in Asia
*SKY and ADO largely reduced yields for the first quarter of FY2006

*The Ministry has requested 18.2% more budgets for tourism-related programs in FY2007

The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport Tourism Division recentlyannounced that it has requested a total of 7,684 million yen for the tourism-related programs in FY2007, 18.2% more than the budget for FY2006. For Visit Japan Campaign (VJC) that will be the 5th year in FY2007 since it began in FY2003, the Ministry has requested another 4,000 million yen, doubling the budget for the first fiscal year.

This Week Headline
*The Ministry has requested 18.2% more budgets for tourism-related programs in FY2007
*CAB has requested 11.4% more budget for airport developments in FY2007
*CAB Director General says: "Range of internationalflights from Haneda should carefully be considered"
*KNT resulted in less revenue than expected for the first six months of 2006
*NTA succeeded in shrinking losses for the first six half of 2006
*MasterCard forecasts Asia/Pacific overseas travelers will record double-digit growth
*ANA will also raise fuel surcharges on its international flights
*Saudi Arabian Airlines begins serving Kansai flight
*Narita resulted in 1% increase of passengers for July