Impact of Japan’s domestic COVID-19 policy on Taiwanese tourists’ intention to visit Japan (First Author)

Kyoritsu business & economics review, 4, p. 1-16, 2024-04
https://kyoritsu.repo.nii.ac.jp/records/2000151

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This study quantitatively measured the effect of trust or lack of trust in Japan’s COVID-19 policies on the travel intentions of Taiwanese tourists, using the propensity score matching method to devise a more positive causality estimation. Based on these results, we concluded that Taiwanese tourists were motivated to travel to Japan if they trusted Japan's measures against COVID-19. Moreover, we examined the consumers’ purposes for visiting Japan in the post-COVID-19 era. Our survey also suggested that the country’s stringent COVID-19 prevention regulations for locations frequented by tourists, such as regularly disinfecting public facilities, providing hand sanitizers, controlling the number of gathered people, and maintaining social distancing in indoor facilities, may be more attractive to tourists. However, contrary to the expectations of other studies, tourists in Taiwan still look forward to revisiting their favourite places. This would have been the most accurate prediction compared to present day. While there have been several studies related to the evaluation of Japan's policies against COVID-19, this study is the first to analyse the opinions of foreign tourists. This study suggested that those who found COVID-19 measures in their home countries more successful and severe may have higher demands for measures against COVID-19 in their tourist destinations. The study also proved that trust of foreign quarantine measures impacted tourism. Domestic public policy should also take into consideration its fast impact on foreign communities via various forms of media in the future.