Spring Airlines, the Shanghai-based private budget airline, announced Sunday it is set to launch its first international route, from Shanghai to Japan, by the end of July, making it the first privately-owned Chinese airline to operate an international route.

"We are awaiting approval from the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) to launch the route in July," Zhang Wu'an, spokesman of Spring Airlines, told the Global Times Monday. "If it goes well, we expect to become the first private carrier in China to operate an international route."

Spring Airlines has signed a contract with the local government of Japan's Ibaraki Prefecture to open an air route between Shanghai and Ibaraki, which lies 80 miles from Tokyo.

"We will begin by operating two to three chartered flights each week for travel agencies, as the application process for launching chartered flights is much simpler than scheduled flights," said Zhang. "We plan to offer scheduled flight tickets to individual travelers from October at prices lower than the current market level."

Spring Airlines announced last July that it had been granted official approval to operate international routes, following a loosening in Chinese government restrictions on private airlines.

Juneyao Airlines, another Shanghai-based private carrier, is also pushing ahead with its international ambitions, and is expected to get an operational license by the end of June, according to a report published on CAAC's website.

According to Zhang, Japan's travel market is set to benefit from an influx of Chinese tourists following a softening of visa restrictions.

The Japanese authorities announced earlier last month that they were cutting the income requirements for Chinese citizens seeking a Japanese visa from 250,000 yuan ($36,612) per year to 60,000 yuan ($8,787). The new policy will take effect from July 1 this year, according to the Xinhua News Agency.

"As far as I have heard from my Japanese partners, the number of Chinese visitors to Japan could swell tenfold to 40 million per year after the new visa policy takes effect," said Zhang.

However, as it also operates its own international travel agency, Spring Airlines is likely to reserve the majority of its chartered flights for its own business.

Zhu Guoping, executive of Japan and Korea tours at Shanghai China International Travel Service (SCITS), told the Global Times that SCITS is not considering any cooperation with Spring Airlines to secure seats on the latter's Japan flights.

"Our airline partners are Air China, China Eastern and All Nippon Airways, as we do not provide budget tour packages," Zhu said. He added that he does not expect a huge surge in Chinese tourists going to Japan this year due to the World Expo 2010 in Shanghai convincing them to visit the city instead.