A city in Shikoku, one of the country's four main islands, is seeking to liven up its Awa Odori dance festival amid the inbound tourism boom partly by addressing a shortage of accommodation.
The summer spectacle in Tokushima draws well over a million spectators to the area but the effect on the local economy has been rather limited due to the scarcity of hotels, preventing overnight stays for visitors.
The traditional folk dance festival started Sunday and will last until Thursday amid caution following the country's first-ever advisory on a potential megaquake in the Nankai Trough, which runs along the Pacific coast. Organizers took steps such as informing the public on where to evacuate in the event of a massive quake.
Last year, the festival was hit by a controversy involving premium seats. Elevated seats priced at 200,000 yen per person, mainly targeting wealthy foreign tourists, were sold, but they were later found to have violated the building standards law, prompting ticket fees to be reimbursed.
The number of guest rooms in hotels and inns in Tokushima stood at around 4,000 as of Aug 5 this year, according to the city government. "Guests staying overnight within the city are usually on business trips," said Shinichiro Okamoto, president of the Grand Palace hotel.
Awa Odori spectators tend to stay in Takamatsu in the neighboring Kagawa Prefecture where hotels and inns are concentrated, municipal officials said.
To address the accommodation shortage, the prefectural government has launched a subsidy program to promote the construction of four-star hotels.
With Japan expecting to see a record 35 million foreign visitors in 2024, the Tokushima prefectural and city governments are also hoping to lure more tourists through new events.
In December, Mickey Mouse and other characters from the Tokyo Disney Resort will join a special parade around JR Tokushima Station during an Awa Odori event to be organized by the prefectural government.
Government surveys showed Tokushima Prefecture ranked at 46th among the country's 47 prefectures in terms of the number of guest rooms at accommodation facilities in fiscal 2022. It was also 46th in the number of overnight stays in 2023.
"First and foremost, we want visitors to know the charm of Tokushima, and with that, encourage them to come back," a senior prefectural official said.
