Go Central Japan was inaugurated last month as the country’s largest DMO, with the appointment of Ashley Harvey, former country manager of VisitBritain’s Japan office, as COO.
The newly established organisation covers nine prefectures in central Japan – Shiga, Fukui, Toyama, Ishikawa, Nagano, Shizuoka, Aichi, Gifu and Mie – as well as the major cities of Nagoya, Shizuoka and Hamamatsu.
Set up by the local bureau of Japan’s tourism ministry, regional chambers of commerce and their member companies – including regional powerhouse Toyota Motor Corp – the new organisation is 50 per cent funded by the private sector while the remainder comes from the national and local governments.
The appointment of a non-native to head a Japanese tourism association is a marked departure from the norm in Japan. Harvey was given the top post after member companies and organisations considered that a foreign marketing expert would better understand the needs and interests of foreign tourists.
“My appointment demonstrates that foreigners with a love of this country are also able to carry out marketing for Japan, and my mission will be to create a professional and effective DMO,” Harvey told TTG Asia.
Harvey hopes to quickly win over local authorities, which in Japan traditionally oversee marketing plans and budgets, and convince them “to trust professional and experienced private-sector managers” in reaching out to the foreign markets.
“We plan to improve and develop the region’s tourism industry and products through education schemes, such as seminars on how companies can raise their digital profiles or how a fan zone can be set up and operated for the 2019 Rugby World Cup.”
To better promote central Japan overseas, Harvey intends to “build up world-class external communications” to target key markets worldwide and will also make extensive use of digital communications, including short films of the destination that can be easily shared on digital media.
