It was only polite of course to sample the Sake Kamotsuru Brewery’s fare, drunk from smart wooden boxes, at the Hiroshima International Airport (HIAP) stand.
The town of Saijo Honmachi, famous for its sake breweries, is only 20 minutes from the airport, and a must-visit for travellers to this region in south-western Japan.
Hiroshima was another first-time Japanese airport at the Langkawi event keen to boast its international traffic base, having relied mainly on domestic travellers until now.
“Inbound tourism to Japan from Asia is booming and we want to capture it,” said Masamichi Nagasaki, Senior Manager at HIAP.
The team was at Routes Asia promoting Hiroshima as a destination with potential for new service from China, Taiwan, and South Korea, in addition to Vietnam and Malaysia.
Hiroshima has frequent services to Tokyo Haneda with 16 flights a day from local carriers and hit the 3 million passenger level in 2019. Numbers came back to 1.8 million in 2023, but international traffic volumes remain “minuscule”.
The airport faces competition from Kansai Osaka and Fukuoka airports, with bullet trains from its catchment area causing significant traffic leakage – but it is determined to promote direct services to the region.
