Duty-Free Arrival Shops Coming To Japan?

Above, a duty-free cigarette shop at Narita Int. Airport's departure level. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

Japan is possibly looking at more duty-free shopping reforms during the 2017 fiscal tax year.

According to TR Business:

The Japanese Transport Ministry is said to be considering the creation of duty free arrivals shops at Japanese airports and ‘US-style’ pre-clearance immigration points at foreign airports to alleviate congestion at the country’s larger Japanese airports. 

According to the normally reliable Japan Times newspaper, the unconfirmed report suggests that Japan’s Transport Ministry ‘will recommend’ the arrivals shop change in the forthcoming fiscal 2017 tax system reform requests – although this doesn’t mean that they will be adopted. Meanwhile, the pre-clearance initiative is expected to be passed separately without any problem. 

The airport groups said to be supporting this latest request to create legislation to facilitate airport duty free shopping are said to include the operators of Sendai International Airport and Kansai International Airport in Osaka.

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