東日本大地震にて被災された皆さまにこの場を借りてお悔やみ申し上げます。
被災地の一日も早い復旧を心からお祈りさせていただきます。
今回の震災については海外でも大きく報道されていますが、アジア最大のオンライン旅行メディアの1つであるWIT(web in travel)から震災の状況や当社運営サイトや国内旅行業界への影響について取材を受けましたのでその内容を紹介します。(英語記事になります)
「日本人は絶滅するのか」、「日本が完全に沈没」、「ゴーストタウンの東京で餓え死」。。等、一部の海外メディアでは極端に誤った報道も散見されており、日本の現状が海外に正確に伝わっているとは思えない中、せめて国外の旅行業界関係者には正確な情報を把握・拡散してもらうことが必要とのメッセージも込めさせていただきました。
(以下、転載)
Help Japan travel by circulating facts
Kei Shibata, CEO of travel.jp, shares an update on the situation in Japan with
WIT and urges industry colleagues to stick to, and circulate, the facts.
Q: Personally, how have you and your family been and how have you copedthis past week?
This past week, we have been staying in town working pretty much as usual.
Due to the problems of public transportation and power (scheduled power
down) as well as the risks of aftershocks and nuclear radiation,some
companies ordered employees to stay home and/or work with different
shifts and the government asked people to save power on every occasion.
Wehave seen some shortages of gas, water and other emergency related
goods but people's life in Tokyo is pretty much in control now and the
situation has improved everyday.
Q: Business-wise, what did it mean for you and what did you do to handlethe crisis?
We saw a big hit in demand for leisure travel, maybe down by 30 to 60% last week.
At the same time, the demand for flights (both domestic and international)
exploded last week, perhaps up by 70% for domestic and more than 100%
for international (outbound to overseas). We believe the majority of
demand came from non-Japanese people including Chinese and Koreans who
wanted to leave Japan for home. So far, we have tried to aggregate
information as much and as accurately as possible by keeping close
contact with the OTAs and by monitoring the web.
Q: Any interesting trends you noticed in online behavior ?
search, social media, the use of mobile etc?
Social media played a huge role in this crisis ? Twitter, Facebook, mixi...
They were widely used to let families and close friends communicate
efficiently (especially for the first few days after 3.11 when the
mobile voice communication broke down) and to find all kinds of news and
useful information related to the crisis.
Q: What are your greatest concerns going forward?
Fears of impact on Japanese outbound and inbound?
Biggest concern is obviously the demand (all outbound, inbound and domestic) which
may stay extremely low for a long period of time.
Q: What's the message you want to send to your travel industry colleagues abroad?
Most of the destinations in Japan including Tokyo are safe and fine.
Please don't misunderstand the situation ? it seems some of the overseas
media have confused people overseas with poor reporting.
Q: What can we do to support Japan's travel industry on which we all depend?
Please stay updated and circulate the facts, and don't listen to rumours and hearsay.
記事詳細(WIT)