Two years have passed since the start of Shimane’s English newspaper, The Deities. Since then, Japan has resumed opening its gates, attracting foreign travellers who enjoy inbound business.
Yet, Shimane hardly attracts such tourists, and it is almost the last place to be selected as their travel destination. Being far from Tokyo or Kyoto and having inconvenient public transportation should be a reason for the prefecture to be kept at a distance from them. Still, we can’t make such an excuse anymore. Shimane overcomes such a challenge by making the most of its historic properties, which our ancestors retained for us, and capitalizing on its intelligence to disseminate prefectural information in foreign languages. In light of this, the role of The Deities is crucial as Shimane’s leading English media.
Shimane has many lovely sightseeing places but hardly makes the most of them in its inbound strategy due to not only a lack of foreign language media but also the locals’ mindset not to transgress its borders: San’in Monroe-ism. This wrong side of the disposition prevents the locals from changing their abroad-oriented mindset and attitudes. Thus, the ‘first thing is first’ is to rectify such an obsolete introspective notion. This is a must and will be inevitable if we are eager to make our business strategy for the resurgence of Shimane Prefecture.
(Takashi Saito)