70% of its hotels lack staff

Becoming one of the great resorts in the world has its price. Spain knows this, as it is on its way to overcoming the 100 million visitors foreigners and become the country with the most tourists of the planet. And Japan certainly knows this, which in recent years has seen its flow of foreign travelers skyrocket to almost the 43 million. That avalanche of people eager to climb Fujisee the geishas and he Sakura or be photographed in Shibuya has strained coexistence in the country, sparking the debate about the tourism and one wave of social rejection.

Japan could, however, have a natural (and unexpected) brake on its tourist expansion: the lack of staff in hotels.

The percentage: 72.2%. In full tourist boom and with Japan breaking records of foreign visitors, the Japanese authorities recently did a curious exercise: they asked the country’s hotels how they are doing. Not in terms of billing and demand, but in terms of their ability to provide services.

It may seem like a strange task, but the truth is that it has revealed a surprising fact: 72.2% Of the more than 500 accommodations surveyed, they acknowledged having fewer staff than they really need. That is to say, in the midst of a tourism boom, it is easier for businesses to attract clients than workers.

Does it affect everyone equally? For their study, the technicians spoke with 522 establishments of all kinds, from large hotel chains to more modest accommodations and ryokan traditional. Of all of them, those that acknowledged having the most difficulties when training their staff are medium-sized businesses, with an annual turnover level of between 100 and 1,000 million yen, equivalent to between 540,000 and 5.4 million euros.

Of the 280 businesses interviewed with these characteristics, 77.1% admitted that it is difficult for him to find professionals. And almost all of them (90%) are companies with less than 100 employees. What’s more, half don’t even reach 30.

One word: overexertion. The problem is not only the greater or lesser shortage of staff, but what this means for the professionals who already work in hotels. The equation is very simple: more work without more staff ends up resulting in greater pressure on the workforce.

The Government study confirms this with figures: 79.3% of accommodations with a lack of staff recognizes that this handicap ends up overloading their staff in high season. 40.6% have no choice but to reduce their services.

The great mystery. The question at this point is obvious… If tourism has become a booming business in Japan and the country aspire While this demand continues to grow, why is it so difficult for hotels to hire staff? l

The answer is complicated and requires handling several keys. The main one: the hospitality industry is not the most desired sector in the country. Low salaries and a lack of breaks discourage the Japanese population from looking for work in the sector, leading the authors of the ‘White Paper’ on Japanese tourism to propose an improvement of working conditions. They also advocate modernizing their accommodations.

Is it the only problem? No. In the background there is another handicap that cannot be ignored either: it is not only that Japan has fewer employees for its hotels, it is that in general Japan has fewer people for everything. Its population has been contracting for yearswhich in turn affects the nation’s labor muscle: if in 2010 it came close to 128.1 million of inhabitants, in 2025 it would not reach 124 million. And a significant part of that population is already very old.

With these data as a backdrop, it is better understood that the sector has chosen to look for talent outside, signing foreign personnel and offering part-time contracts. Ironically, in recent years Japan he hasn’t made it easy to immigrants who come to the country to work or undertake, hardening the conditions that must be met to qualify for resident status.

It is estimated that at the end of 2025, Japan would host slightly more than four million of foreign residents, an interesting figure on two counts: it represents 9.5% more than the previous year and (above all) a new historical record.

A not so new notice. This is not the first time that Japan has seen alarm bells go off due to labor shortages in the tourism sector. He did it in 2025when the Asia Pacific Institute of Research warned that the country risked suffering a deficit of hundreds of thousands of hospitality workers.

Specifically, it estimates that if the nation maintains its goal of reaching 60 million tourists in 2030, it will find itself with a ‘hole’ of about 536,000 employees. The problem is the same: demand in hotels and restaurants increases, but the sector’s muscle to meet it is not strengthened.

Even the aviation sector would have problems. In 2024 Bloomberg warned that to reach the goal of 60 million tourists the country will need many more pilots. At the moment the flow of foreign visitors remains below the 43 millionbut the trend is clear growth.

Images | IK’s World Trip (Flickr), Ramon Buçard (Unsplash) and Victoriano Izquierdo (Unsplash)

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