JAPAN – The president of Reed Exhibitions Japan has called overseas coverage of the natural disaster that hit the country last month ‘excessive’, unduly damaging the local exhibition industry and creating an unsubstantiated fear of attending events in Japan.
Tad Ishizumi, president of Reed Exhibitions Japan and chairman of the Japanese Exhibition Association, says Tokyo has almost completely recovered from the crisis, which shook Reed’s Japanese HQ and led to several event cancellations.
However, following a lengthy dialogue with the concerned parties, Ishizumi claims Reed is winning business back one organiser at a time.
“Our office did not close at all, and all of us have been working from 14 March,” he told EW. “Our employees are working harder than ever to overcome every difficulty and each show team is expressing a strong commitment to the success of the show.
“The disaster has brought a strong unity to our organisation,” he added.
However, Ishizumi claims newspaper-shifting headlines are painting a distorted picture of the situation that exists in parts of Japan such as Tokyo, which is distanced from the disaster-struck prefecture of Sendai and the stricken and subsequently decommissioned Fukushima nuclear facility.
“We are facing difficulties because the excessively negative news that was broadcast has made people overseas afraid to come to Japan,” he said. “We have received a number of cancelations, but we are convincing them to exhibit one by one. At FineTech Japan, scheduled for mid April, 600 of 700 companies will exhibit, and visitor registration is around the same as usual. We are making every effort to overcome this situation and bring business to exhibitors.”
One key misconception, according to Ishizumi, is that radiation level of Tokyo has risen to unhealthy levels. “There is no threat visiting Tokyo. Bloomberg says that the level of radiation in Tokyo is around the same as New York,” he points out.
And while there was a mood in Japan to voluntarily postpone all events shortly after the disaster struck, that viewpoint has since changed.
“Now many Government bodies say that holding events as usual will help the economic recovery, and it is essential that exhibitions go ahead,” he commented, adding that all future exhibitions organised by Reed Exhibitions Japan will be held as scheduled.
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