Osaka casino may feel Japan tourism backlashMuhammad Cohen

Visitors to Japan have more than tripled since 2014, from 13.4 million to nearly 43 million last year. Japan authorities are aiming for 60 million tourists by 2040.

Noted writer Pico Iyer, who has called Japan home for 38 years, says many Japanese find escalating visitor numbers “disruptive,” prompting backlash against tourists. Anti-tourist sentiment could spill over to the MGM Osaka integrated resort project, Iyer said in an exclusive interview at the Ubud Writers and Readers Festival in Bali. The US$8.9 billion Osaka project, shown above, featuring Japan’s first legal casino, broke ground a year ago and is scheduled to open in 2030.

Former US diplomat and broadcast news producer Muhammad Cohen is Asia editor at large for Clarion Media, a longtime contributor to Forbes, columnist for Asia Times and author of Hong Kong On Air, a novel set in his adopted hometown during the 1997 handover about TV news, love, betrayal, high finance, and cheap lingerie. See his biography, online archive and more at www.muhammadcohen.com; follow him on Facebook, LinkedIn, ex-Twitter @MuhammadCohen and now on Blue Sky @MuhammadCohen.bsky.social.