Inbound Strategy of Local Management to Improve Grassroots Innovations

──From the Viewpoint of Community Tourism Development (MICE) after the Great East Japan Earthquake──

抄録

The strategy for increasing the number of visitors to Japan, MICE has been adopted as an effective way to increase the number of overseas exchanges through large-scale international conferences, training and exhibitions, and policies made through national and local governments. However, the image of MICE so far is that the scale of participation is large and the program cannot deal with small and medium-sized municipalities in terms of facilities, personnel, costs, management skills, etc. The MICE policy of subsidizing only large-scale projects has not fully achieved its potential strength from small and medium-sized MICE activities.

 The research has shown that a small-scale MICE could be valuable in revitalizing local economies and society utilizing regional resources through sustainable and resolute implementation. This “small scale, grassroots MICE that contributes to local management” is referred to as “Community MICE” here. This perspective could contribute to improve agility of governments and creating new businesses and innovation after the Great East Japan Earthquake.