As the largest tour party the province has ever organized, it is expected to help promote the province's businesses in the Japanese tourist market, said Yu Fenggui, deputy director of the provincial tourist bureau.

He added Shandong will cooperate with the All Japan Airways to launch a large-scale tourist promotion program. The airways is to operate another flight between Tokyo and Qingdao, a major coastal tourist city in the province.

This year marks the 30th anniversary of the normalization of diplomatic relations between China and Japan, and the exchange of tourists between the two countries is expected to increase markedly, sources said.

Japanese tourists to Shandong have been increasing steadily over the past decade and account for about 30 percent of the overseas tourists who have visited the province in recent years.

(People's Daily January 26, 2002)