NEWS

On Friday, January 17, the fifth of the 20th Anniversary APU Faculty Lectures in Tokyo series took place at the Ritsumeikan Tokyo Campus. About 34 people gathered to listen to a lecture by APU Professor Thomas Jones of the College of Asia Pacific Studies titled "Thinking of measures to address overtourism: From Mt. Fuji to the world!"

Overtourism, or excessive tourism, is becoming a problem for top global sightseeing destinations, in particular at World Heritage sites. While Japan as a tourism-oriented country is developing, tourist destinations such as Kyoto are over capacity and are suffering the effects of overtourism. In this lecture, Professor Jones discussed sustainable tourism practices at tourist destinations in Japan and abroad, introducing real-world cases and actual measures taken. He focused on the case of Mt. Fuji, where de-marketing measures—aimed at decreasing the number of climbers and tourists—are being taken in order to reduce congestion and environmental degradation.

Held as part of the run up to APU's 20th anniversary celebration, this was the final lecture in the series of monthly lectures held at Ritsumeikan Tokyo Campus since the series began in September 2019.