Croatia and Japan have signed an Air Service Agreement following five years of negotiations as both sides seek to establish scheduled services between the two nations. “Direct air travel will significantly contribute to the exchange of tourists between the two countries and ease the process of fostering economic and other forms of cooperation. Moreover, it will not only strengthen Croatia’s partnership with Japan but also with other nations in the Far East, particularly the member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)”, the Croatian Ministry for Foreign and European Affairs said in a statement. The Japanese Ministry for Foreign Affairs added, “Considering the possibility and forecasts, there is sufficient air traffic demand for scheduled air services between Japan and the Republic of Croatia in the future".
Intergovernmental negotiations for the Air Service Agreement began in November 2018, and an in principle deal was reached in November of last year. Prior to the global health emergency, in 2019, when Croatia boasted nonstop flights to South Korea, Japan was the country’s largest unserved market in Asia and the third overall. That year, a total of 32.051 passengers flew indirectly between Japan and Croatia. The bulk of those travelled between Tokyo and Zagreb, which was Zagreb Airport’s second busiest unserved route and the busiest in Asia at the time. Other Japanese cities with notable traffic to Croatia included Osaka, Nagoya and Fukuoka. The real potential of the Japan - Croatia market is believed to be significantly higher, with many Japanese travellers entering the country by bus through Slovenia or other markets in central Europe.
Despite Zagreb being the main entry point for Japanese tourists visiting Croatia, the majority head onwards to Dubrovnik. Prior to the pandemic, Japan's largest airline, All Nippon Airways (ANA), operated summer charters from several cities to Dubrovnik. Previously, Zagreb also boasted charters from Tokyo. During those years, Croatia saw a notable increase in Japanese arrivals compared to those years charter flights from Japan were operating at a reduced rate. JAL currently codeshares on Finnair’s seasonal service between Helsinki and Zagreb, while ANA has its designator code and flight numbers on Lufthansa’s Frankfurt – Zagreb operation.
Japanese arrivals in Croatia by year
The initiative for the introduction of scheduled flights from Japan to Croatia is said to have come from the Japanese side five years ago. The Croatian Ministry for Tourism has listed Japan as one of its prime markets. "The Ministry's strategic goal is to develop Croatia as a destination which is accessible to various airlines, particularly before and after the height of the summer season. That is why we are turning towards the Asian market, primarily Korea, Japan and China, where we are concentrating a lot of our efforts".
Congratulations to the government for working on securing Japan flights before Berlin, year-round flights to Stockholm, New York, Chicago, Los Angeles... but hey... why not.
ReplyDeleteAnd PRG, OTP, SOF, TGD, TIA, SKG…
DeleteCroatia Airlines about to announce A220 flights to Tokyo :P
DeleteIt actually makes sense. If they use the A220 then they can also launch Tashkent in the process. HDZ can brag how they launched flights to both Japan and Uzbekistan which shows what an economic powerhouse Croatia has become under their leadership.
DeleteZAG-TAS-HND
DeleteIt says in the aticle the initiative came from the Japanese side.
DeleteProbably from the Japanese embassy in Zagreb.
DeleteThe former ambassador was from the ministry of transport.
DeleteThink it will be a few years until these start. I believe tourist numbers need to recover to close to 2019 levels.
ReplyDeleteEspecially now that Russian airspace is closed and flights to/From Japan are much more costly.
DeleteThis is why JAL starting to fly to DOH.
DeleteWell this is one of the ways of ensuring the tourist numbers improve. You don't just sit around and wait for them to come to you.
DeleteBesides, tourist numbers have already recovered to close to 2019. levels last year. This year will probably surpass 2019. especially given we've currently reached a million visitors per day...for the first time ever.
How yes no😂
ReplyDeleteI don't think it's so far fetched considering there were many charter flights from many Japanese cities to Croatia.
DeleteIt's much safer for them to operate charter flights where seats are sold by tour operators.
DeleteWould be nice but I don't think it will happen any time soon.
ReplyDeleteWhy did it take so long to negotiate an air service agreement?!? I mean I would have thought it would be straightforward, especially with Japan.
ReplyDeleteAnd people claim that Asia market has recovered. Number of visitors says a lot about the recovery.
ReplyDeleteAsian markets have recovered mostly, they just no longer travel in big numbers to Europe.
DeleteExcept for mainland China, it's recovered. They cannot travel in big numbers, because the airlines are not allocating many seats to tour operators anymore.
DeleteThere is still a lot of capacity missing for flights to mainland China while demand is huge. That's why tickets to China are crazy expensive at the moment.
DeleteLol
ReplyDeleteI don't know why it is so funny. Croatia has had nonstop charters from Japan for years until Covid.
DeleteHuge difference between having some charter flights and having scheduled flights.
DeleteYes and then Putin closed his airspace for Japanese carriers making flights at least an hour longer. If HDZ was smart they would work on bringing a Chinese airline to ZAG since they can fly over Russia and offer thousands of daily connections each day.
DeleteZAG-PEK
ZAG-PVG
ZAG-CAN
ZAH-HKG
@ it wasn't "some" charters, there were many of them, some even operated with B747s. It is definitely a good sign and shows there is demand.
DeleteB747 was retired quite while ago. ZAG lost Asian charters long before covid, ANA was mostly focusing on LJU. DBV had some.
DeleteZAG was not interesting for them that much.
When it comes to our Croatian politicians and discussing the new routes you know that nothing will happen.
ReplyDeleteBingo
DeleteThey don’t have flights to major European cities but they’ll have to Tokyo that’s hilarious…
ReplyDeleteThey had flights to Seoul without having flights to some major European cities.
DeleteAnd how did those ICN flights work out for them?
DeleteIt worked fine until the pandemic. In fact they had announced capacity increase on the route for 2020
DeleteIt did not work fine even before the pandemic as loads never went beyond 70%. There is a reason why they linked those flights with Zurich.
DeleteAlso if they were so strong they would be back like Toronto flights. Korean carriers are simply putting focus on other markets like BUD and VIE.
I think the next airport in the region to get ICN flights will be BEG when JU launches them.
I would really like to know where this information of 70% load factor comes from?
DeleteBEG and JU will be looking at South East Asia before Korea ans Japan. The government just joined the south east Asian economic group.
DeleteAnd have good relations with Singapore maybe that will be first for JU after China expansion
^ no it was said many times by the airline itself that North America will be expanding after China and that after that they will look at Korea, Japan and/or India.
DeleteAnon 10.22
DeleteIt was published some time ago for all long-haul routes. You can find it online, it was some Bosnian portal.
It will be PVG, CAN, and maybe another Chinese destination. After it will be MIA and YYZ. Only after are they looking at Japan, Korea, and India.
DeleteI think our travel agencies and national tourist boards could do more on promoting the area in countries such as Japan. We have to compete for the new markets and not be focusing on the tourists from the West only.
ReplyDeleteHTZ does pretty good promotion in Asia.
DeleteActually, Croatia Tourist Board had closed its Tokyo office long before the pandemic.
DeleteIf they come mostly to visit Dubrovnik, then maybe flights to DBV would make more sense than ZAG.
ReplyDeleteGood luck! There is definitely potential.
ReplyDeleteUnused potential. Wasted potential. Potential OU didn't take opportunity and didn't care about. Combination of long-haul potential and Balkans /ex-yu transfer potential for tourists and diaspora in North America and Asia. I have been talking about it for years. But instead, OU decided to be pathetic servant and humiliated feeder for LH, with single type fleet, the most expensive on the market in its category
DeleteMy guess is that besides YYZ-ZAG there is not enough demand for nonstop longhaul flights. I mean others have tried, from Malaysian to Korean, to make it work and they all have one thing in common: they failed.
DeleteKorean didn't fail. They planned to increase 3 to 4 weekly frequencies before pLandemic. Pan Am did not fail in ZAG but went to bankruptcy. Malaysian did not fail but was not given rights to fly nonstop which they wanted. Air Canada didn't fail but stopped ZAG due to the war in ex-yu. Emirates didn't fail, they had over 90 % LF during summer with business class regularly sold out but Far East and Australia markets haven't fully recovered yet. Plus I am not speaking about potentials of croatian market only but markets all over ex-yu and entire Balkans which could have boosted already existing demand on croatian market and that's precisely what makes it only one failure here, the one of Croatia Airlines. But people who are either mean, or have no clue about aviation, or writing things on Party duty, obviously deny the obvious
DeletePozdrav, just get used to everything failing when it comes to Zagreb and Croatia. There's no demand for Croatia, local people don't fly...etc. It's the same old laughable repertoire seen under every article concerning Croatian airports and ZAG especially.
DeleteOtherwise, I give you hard time now and again, but ultimately I do agree with you about OU. The only difference is, you haven't given up on them...and I have.
OU, with respect to any Croatian government, whether it's HDZ or SDP or some coalition, functions the same way.
It's a parasite, an atavism of the old system, a system like the Chinese one today..some would call it state capitalism.
It simply doesn't work in this sector. It only causes Croatian taxpayers to fund their nonchalant attitude.
No hard feelings on my side, even if it seemed so 😃 Happy about what you just posted 😃
DeleteBravo Hrvatska!
ReplyDeleteIt's good that they are thinking about new markets. Would be fantastic to have regular flights to Japan.
ReplyDeleteI really do hope that something materializes out of this.
ReplyDeleteSeasonal route from Tokyo to Dubrovnik would make most sense.
ReplyDeleteThe route cannot be filled without tour operators, but Dubrovnik has no hotel capacity to support this.
DeleteSo many triggered commentators.
ReplyDeleteSo many unrealistic expectations.
DeleteThey signed an air service agreement and expressed interest in introducing flights. I don't know what is the issue? Did anyone promise flights? No. Did anyone say they will launch 100%? No.
DeleteSlovenia signed an air agreement with Rwanda, we are still waiting on those flights. Same with Japan and Croatia.
DeleteThey actually have not. They are negotiating an air service agreement with them and said the reason for it is for cargo flights.
DeleteWith all due respect Slovenia is not tourism powerhouse like Croatia which has worldwide awareness and likeability for its coast, islands, and Dubrovnik. Also, unlike Rwanda people, Japanese do travel a lot. But Croatia doesn't have national carrier willing to help developing tourism, they'll spend a year organizing Mostar flights while long haul money waits to be taken. The situation is similar to Serbia: if the national carrier doesn't do it, the others will go only for most profitable routes. Luckily, during the season there are a lot of profitable ones.
DeleteJedan El Prat nema letove za Japan sad ce Kroejsha koja ima manje turista od njih. Par cartera i to je sve.
Delete"With all due respect Slovenia is not tourism powerhouse like Croatia"
DeleteThe delusion is real. Croatia is not even close to being a tourism powerhouse, it's an emerging destination at best. There are small islands in Europe that have more air traffic than the whole of Croatia.
Slovenia is not a tourism powerhouse though LOL. Croatia is one of the most visited European countries by tourists in summer.
DeleteYou can't be serious and say: "Croatia is not even close to being a tourism powerhouse". Or you're biased, there's no third explanation. In the last 10 years, the number of tourists went from 11 million to almost 19 million last year with Croatia being constantly in Top 10 European tourism markets and closing the gap with Portugal (even having more tourists than Portugal during Covid). There's even over-tourism issue, with Dubrovnik having more tourists than Barcelona (or Venice) just before Covid. Oh well, I guess Barcelona and Venice are not tourism powerhouses either.
DeleteFew facts:
Delete1. Austria makes more money and have year round tourists even though it has 0 km sea coast and its real power house
2. Slovenia is 2 times smaller than Croatia yet has 6mio visitors and its second most visited exyu country - seaside tourism is not the only type of tourism out there honey visited by more than 30mio ppl (not to mention how much money they make)
3. Just part of spanish coast (baleares) have similar number of tourists …
4. Croatia is not even in top 10 by visits in europe so hardly a powerhouse… just because u make 25% gdp with tourism doesn’t mean you are a powerhouse… it means you dont have much of other industries;)
“ visited by more than 30mio ppl (not to mention how much money they make)” - is part of austria comment
Delete"With Dubrovnik having more tourists than Barcelona (or Venice) just before Covid" LOL!
DeleteDubrovnik 1,4mio
Barcelona 9,9mio
Venice 5.5mio
Why are you making up things?!?
@anon 20:25 Yes, Slovenia is doing good for its size but so is Croatia.
DeleteAnd speaking of facts: Croatia is and has been in the top ten for quite some time now, before covid and even post covid, including last year and the one before that. Last year it was No.8 in Europe, behind Portugal and ahead of Switzerland.
That's objectively an impressive result for such a small country.
Also, the proportion of tourism sector in GDP, in a way, is too high in Croatia with 11.8% at its height in 2019. but it's not 25%.
The bigger problem is the fact that given the number of visitors, the proportion of tourism revenue should be much higher.
In other words, the quality and productivity, should go up.
I mean, if you're purportedly talking facts, you're getting them wrong.
Flights from US to ZAG would make most sense at this moment. Then we could see Japan flights in my opinion.
ReplyDeleteUS to ZAG has too few year-round travellers to make it profitable. The traffic would mostly be diaspora, which overwhelmingly travels only in the summer.
DeleteThis is why JU is still not considering Toronto, and is meanwhile flying weekly to Tianjin, and is planning Miami. For it to be profitable, they need enough travellers in November, and February, and May; not just July/August.
Croatia Airlines shot themselves in the foot when they joined Star Alliance. This essentially prohibited them from launching long-distance destinations without the approval of the Alliance. The the big alliance partners can have them competing for transfer passengers from far destinations. Air Serbia doesn't have those constraints, which is why they are getting 3rd and 4th wide-body aircraft, and opening whichever destinations the can make profitable.
I don't believe there's a commercial interest from Japanese carriers. It was just a political performance from the Croatian government. And the Croatia media was sensationalizing with misleading headlines as if direct flight to Tokyo will be established soon. JAL just announced HND - DOH, they are more keen on feeding PAX to QR network to niche destinations in Europe. ANA hasn't even restored DUS yet and IST, MXP, ARN which were supposed to be launched in 2020. Maybe seasonal flights by Zipair or AirJapan if ZAG provides them with great incentives, but no healthy outbound demands from Croatia to Japan. This is always a problem for long-haul in the Balkans. And Japanese carriers also struggle without tour operators, but there's not enough hotel capacity for the leisure group market in Croatia. And what OU can do with the new A220... or the scammer Pragusa.
ReplyDeleteThere clearly is demand. Over 159 thousand Japanese came to Croatia highest numbers. And top 3 underved Asian markets.
DeleteAnd obviously it won't be served by OU. This was about Japanese carriers. But as for will ot happen only time will tell.
That was a very good number of tourists from Japanese market before Covid
ReplyDelete+1
DeleteFlights to Japan are so expensive. Anyone know why that is? I know tourists are going back to Japan in big numbers but fares are out of this world, even on Gulf carriers.
ReplyDeleteYou answered it yourself, everyone and their dog is going to Japan this year after three years of closure.
DeleteMust admit I was one of them :D but I flew from Asia on Zippair - JAL's low cost long haul leisure airline. They fly B787s. Must admit I was really surprised how good the flight and airline was. You have to pay for everything (food, beverages) but prices are cheaper than in the store, aircraft immaculately clean, really nice crew and free fast speed wifi on board :) Would recommend everyone to visit Japan.
DeleteYQ is still high and the closure of the Russian airspace has an impact, but the real reason is the demand and supply. The demand is huge and airlines can easily fill the flight with higher fares. You can still score a decent price if you shop around. I booked my holiday flight from ZAG to NRT 600€, which is still expensive compared to what I paid before the Covid 480€, but it's not bad either.
DeleteIn my opinion ANA as Star Alliance member would make most sense. ANA is also launching leisure low cost airline AirJapan next year, so that's a possibility too.
ReplyDeleteIs it possible for ZAG to become something like MXP ili BCN for flights from somewhere to US?
ReplyDeleteNo
DeleteWill there be ANA charters to Dubrovnik this year?
ReplyDeleteNo
DeleteThe market is not that big to start with and the one that already exists is served by LH, TK, QR and FZ/EK. I don't see much of a point.
ReplyDeleteYou miss something cause LH, TK, QR, FZ/EK do see a point.
DeleteThose airlines carry all sorts of passengers, not just those from Japan.
DeleteHow about Tokyo - Ljubljana - Zagreb - Tokyo? :)
ReplyDeleteAre there flights from Japan to Budapest?
ReplyDeleteNo
DeleteRealistically speaking, I think it can happen in 3-4 years.
ReplyDeleteAgree
DeleteI know they won't, but Croatia should acquire A332 and fly to New York, Seoul, Tokyo... But here we are asking ourselves if ZAG-OTP will become a thing
ReplyDeleteAs long as Croatia remains in the Star Alliance, they won't be flying to New York. The big alliance partners (Lufthansa, Austrian, Swiss) won't let them syphon away transfer passengers. Alliance can block such decisions ("You do regional, we take your passengers across oceans, end of discussion!").
DeleteI think the only way we can get flights like that from the US or Asia is that Croatia airlines leases a wide body aircraft and starts them themselves
ReplyDeleteZAG could work from Tokyo twice per week during summer and once weekly in winter. I don't think anything more could succeed, at least at the beginning.
ReplyDeleteNo airline is going to maintain a one weekly flight. Especially long haul.
DeleteWhat about Air Serbia flying 1 weekly to Tianjin :D
DeleteThat is purely because they could not get a permit for more flights. They managed to secure extra frequency for next winter.
DeleteDoes ANA have a codeshare with anyone to Zagreb?
ReplyDeleteYes it says in the artcicle
Delete"JAL currently codeshares on Finnair’s seasonal service between Helsinki and Zagreb, while ANA has its designator code and flight numbers on Lufthansa’s Frankfurt – Zagreb operation."
DeleteMissed that, thank you
DeleteJapanese tourists are quite adventurous so they could land in Zagreb and then go to places like Sarajevo, Mostar, Dubrovnik, Skopje, Belgrade, Novi Sad, and Pula. These flights could boost some regional flights as well.
ReplyDeleteThe only problem is they spend only 1-2 days everywhere.
DeleteBEG could get JU service to TYO in the next couple of years. BEG is already connected by air to all those cities except Mostar and Novi Sad (30mins by Serbian version of Shinkansen).
Delete@21:11
DeleteThats a very generous observation of the train to NS.
This would be fantastic
ReplyDeleteIf these ever start it will be similar as Korean Air back in the day. Seasonal flights.
ReplyDeleteThey will flight with their brand new A220-300
ReplyDeleteYou forgot shiny. "Brand new shiny A220 fleet". That's the correct way delusional people write about it 😃
Delete