Hawaii’s visitor industry cannot make a full recovery until international visitors, which make up nearly half of Oahu’s tourism market, return.

Hawaii’s visitor industry has been slowly coming back from pandemic lows. But while domestic visitors to Hawaii rose 32% in March, international visitors to Hawaii fell more than 98%.

The problem is that most international travelers still aren’t allowed to come to Hawaii without quarantining, and those who do face onerous COVID-19 restrictions upon their return home. That’s not expected to change until the world sees much greater vaccine distribution and far fewer infections.

It was promising that South Korea announced Wednesday that it plans to lift the mandatory travel quarantine for residents who are fully vaccinated against COVID. Japan also plans to introduce a “vaccine passport” for international travel, according to news reports. Still, neither country has set a date.

Hawaii Tourism Authority President and CEO John De Fries said, “The U.S. market is going to carry Hawaii tourism though the summer and third quarter.”

HTA told marketing contractors to presume Japan wouldn’t relaunch until December. HTA has similar expectations for Oceania, but De Fries said perhaps Canada could recover in September or October.

Hawaii had hoped to recover its top international tourism market of Japan much faster, but early efforts to reach a travel bubble agreement with Japan failed. And, it wasn’t until Nov. 6 when the state finally began allowing Japanese travelers to participate in Safe Travels Hawaii, which allows them to pre-test out of the mandatory travel quarantine.

Travelers from Korea were added to Safe Travels Hawaii on Feb. 5. The state added travelers from Taiwan and Southern California’s Ontario International Airport on April 17.

So far, Safe Travels Hawaii hasn’t successfully reopened Hawaii’s international markets. HTA reported Thursday that only 1,836, or less than 1%, of the 439,785 visitors who traveled to Hawaii last month came from international markets.

That’s a key reason why Oahu, where 46% of the tourism market is typically international, took about a 13% hit to both March spending and arrivals.

Oahu has the most to lose if international arrivals, especially from Japan, don’t come back soon.

Domestic visitor arrivals to Honolulu are expected to recover by 2022, but international visitor arrivals aren’t expected to make a full rebound until 2024, according to new data from Symphony Tourism Economics, which was prepared for HTA.

Hawaii Tourism Japan’s managing director, Eric Takahata, said, “The companies that make up Hawaii’s Japan tourism markets collectively have been losing more than $200 million a month for more than a year now,” he said.

Takahata said the travel industry is expecting Hawaii to be the No. 1 travel destination for Japan once outbound travel resumes. But he said Hawaii could face competition from destinations like Singapore, Australia and Hong Kong that already have begun conducting aggressive campaigns.

Hawaii companies with Japan tourism interests appealed Wednesday to HTA’s standing marketing committee not to make further cuts to its Japan marketing budget, which already had dropped to $4.5 million from $9 million.

John Morgan, president and owner of Kualoa Ranch, told HTA’s marketing committee that prior to COVID the Japanese market was 40% of his business.

“At one point, in the height of COVID, we had furloughed 300 people out of 370,” Morgan said. “We have brought back a little over 200 now, and we can put a lot more people back to work if we get the Japanese market back.”

Sam Shenkus, vice president and director of marketing for the Royal Hawaiian Center, said the center’s restaurants are doing well, but retail won’t come back until international shoppers return.

“We’re getting better but we’re still off double digits,” Shenkus said. “We’re hoping that we can be even by the early to late third quarter of this year, but it all depends on if the international market is back.”

The importance of the international markets to Hawaii’s tourism recovery is part of the reason HTA hasn’t embraced deeper cuts when its still facing a nearly $20 million reduction to its fiscal 2022 budget.

The Japan market has the largest international budget, so it’s faced the most scrutiny, notably from state Sen. Glenn Wakai (D, Kalihi-Salt Lake-Aliamanu), who chairs the Senate Committee on Energy, Economic Development and Tourism. But so far, Pattie Herman, HTA’s vice president of marketing and product development, and HTA’s marketing committee aren’t recommending additional cuts to their global marketing teams.

Herman said further cuts could bring contract penalties or prevent contractors from having enough resources and flexibility to swiftly respond to market changes.

Wakai, who had questioned HTA’s return on marketing investment during the pandemic, expressed continued disappointment.

He said lawmakers had originally planned to eliminate HTA’s focus on Hawaiian culture, the environment and the community but left those pillars intact with the idea that HTA would “cut marketing and administration so that their other programs could continue to be funded.”