Arrivals to South Africa from Japan plummeted 31% year on year for the month of July, the biggest decline of all the Asian markets, with 1 492 arrivals in July this year compared with 2 170 in July last year.

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This is according to the latest arrival stats published last week by Statistics South Africa, which showed that arrivals from Asia were down 22% in July.

Japan is the third-largest source market from Asia after India and China, and accounted for 8% of arrivals from Asia for the first seven months of the year. Japanese nationals do not require a visa to travel to South Africa.

The decline of the Japanese market in July outstrips the drop Japan has experienced year to date. Arrivals from Japan were down 28% for the first seven months of the year, with 10 234 arrivals compared with 14 139 for the same period last year.