What Aids Japan Needs and Why from the Natural Disaster

Osaka - Sunday, March 20, 2011




There have been much aids from many countries, regions and people around the globe, including human resources of experts in various realm and donations of goods/materials, to rescue and heal people, to clear rubbles from major roads and Sendai airport to secure transportation channels, and to help people without homes and deliver necessities and energy fuels and to such people and staff/places helping them, to name a few. With such supports, there has been a big progress in the first week since the earthquake and tsunami that struck northern east Japan on March 11.



The author specializes in marketing and is not an expert in this realm; however,　following the previous article The Reality of Japan Disaster – Affecting Nationwide which is the overview of the affect of the natural disaster as of March 19, the author would like to share what aids are ongoing and what aids she believes is vital and why to minimize negative effect on global and Japanese economy, from the first hand information she acquired from her online friends throughout Japan and what she and her employer have been doing as well as Japanese and western media and other sources.



1. What aids are ongoing besides the aids that countries and regions kindly offered immediately after the natural disaster?






1) From media



Media have been making upmost efforts to communicate critical information in a timely manner. Japanese media immediately started campaigns to collect relief money.



2) From companies



Companies including those that were severely affected by the disaster immediately started their own aids leveraging their business and products.



Telecommunication companies such as SoftBank, NTT and Google immediately started providing services to help confirm safety of people in devastated area as well as quickly recovering from mobile phones not being connected in Kanto (Tokyo etc.) immediately after the earthquake.



Automobile and consumer electronics companies (especially Japan big 3 of automobile companies; and consumer electronics giants such as Panasonic and Toshiba) most of which are severely affected because many of them have core plants in hardly hit Tohoku area, were quick in their action. They decided to provide financial aids (e.g. donate 300 million yen) plus their products. Automobile companies decided to donate cars and trucks for transportation of necessities. As an example of consumer electronics, Panasonic decided to donate batteries, radios and TVs so that people in evacuation centres to help people in evacuation centres obtain information and lead daily lives. As in the case of Nissan, they also welcomed 100+ people in their global HQ in Yokoyama on March 11 who could not go home when train services became unavailable.



Healthcare/pharmaceutical companies, Japanese and foreign affiliates (e.g. Takeda, Daiichi-Sankyo, Pfizer, Novartis, GSK, MSD), have been providing aids with similar concept; i.e. financial aids (100-300 million yen) via Red Cross and for some companies donation of medicine in addition. Shortage of medicine in devastated area is becoming a serious issue so this has much meaning.



Many companies of other industries have been providing aids in the same manner, and many foreign affiliates have been supportive as well. A few examples of the companies that the author’s friends works for include P&G (Japan office located in Kobe) that decided to provide financial aids and already sent some of their products such as diapers as donation based on their lessons from the Kobe earthquake in 1995, and IBM that provided some IT services for free.



3) From NPO/NGO and other organizations, local communities



Many NPOs and NGOs, worldwide and Japan, also were quick to take actions to provide aids leveraging their strengths.



As in the case of Japan, NPOs, NGOs and local communities immediately started campaigns of collecting relief money and goods. They also started planning how to organize and dispatching volunteers when we get to that phase.



Campaign of collecting relief money was initiated by famous athletes in sport games.



Many local communities (groups of people) in the devastated area voluntarily established unofficial evacuation centres.



Groups of hotels in spa resort area in midlands (away from the devastated area) started to welcome people evacuated from Tohoku area in their rooms.



4) From small and mid sized business owners, individuals



Business owners of small and mid sized business and individuals have also been setting up their own campaign to collect relief money and/or promoting campaigns of collecting relief money, as well as proactively sharing valuable information.



There is also a case in which the concept/objective of their upcoming event due in middle of April is now changed from sharing information and matching business owners to start and drive businesses to charity.



Many Japanese celebrities (business owners, TV stars and singers, journalists, athletes) announced that they will give relief money and/or give revenue from events etc. as charity.



2. What aids are still necessary, from Japan and from around the globe?






1) Goods, medicines



Necessities (food, water, blankets etc.) have started to arrive in the devastated area; however, one-time delivery will not keep people there to survive.



Fuel to keep people warm is also necessary. The temperature in Tohoku in this time of the year is still low. In fact it was as cold as middle of winter within the first week after the disaster and it snowed.



Medicine will started to arrive in the area soon but one-time delivery for this also will not be sufficient. Shortage of medicine and medical experts is becoming a serious issue. A few elders already died in evacuation centre and flue has emerged. Without medical aid it is quite likely that people who were rescued to survive the disaster would die.



Goods (e.g. foods) disappeared from shelves of supermarkets in Kanto area (e.g. Tokyo, Kanagawa/Yokohama, Chiba) and there seems to have been only little improvement but there are sufficient goods for people throughout Japan so as for area other than Tohoku it is the matter of Japanese consumers calming down instead of buying up more than they need for speculative stocking.



2) Transportation to deliver goods and medicines



This includes transportation vehicles and fuels. The key would probably be supply of fuels (gasoline/petrol). Shortage of gasoline has been a serious issue. For this reason, there were many cases in which goods arrived to places near Tohoku but could not be delivered to evacuation centres. Shortage of gasoline also made people in the Tohoku area with cars unable to evacuate smoothly.



3) Rebuilt of life lines and social infrastructure



One reason why goods and fuels could not be delivered to Tohoku smoothly was the fact that social infrastructures including roads, which are inevitable for transportation of goods, were collapsed completely. It is why gasoline companies have been trying to supply gasoline from Japan Sea side.



Now primary route to deliver goods to main area is established but smaller routes to deliver to all the evacuation centres are not yet established.



And of course, the total area (many areas/cities are still flooded, covered with rubbles), needs to be rebuilt from scratch; from roads, buildings and houses, to supply of electricity, water and communication services. It simply reminds many people of rebuilding the country from World War II.



4) Resources, especially financial aid



Much resource would be necessary for ongoing rescuing, delivery of goods and medicines, helping people in evacuation centres survive and start getting back to “normal” lives, and rebuilding life lines and social infrastructure that is expected to take at least 5 years, according to the estimation of a Japanese expert based on the recovery from Kobe earthquake in 1995.



It is likely that extra resource aids become necessary in regions outside Tohoku, too. This is because prefectures and cities including those that have been affected by aftershocks and blackouts decided to welcome people evacuating from Tohoku area.



5) Information and environment to proceed with the total recovery



It is public and private sector, academia and individuals of Japan that are ultimately responsible for the recovery, with further help from other countries and regions, and such help includes “soft” aspects as well as “hard” aspects of goods, medicines, human resources and financial aids.



What the author means by “soft” aspects includes economic environment, appropriate information sharing, and mental assistance.



Key economic environment determinant include stock market price and foreign currency rate. As for the latter, the yen reached as high as 76 yen per USD, the highest in history, which was rather difficult to understand why, after the disaster. Such a high yen would be a huge negative factor for recovery of companies and the country when the recovery of Japan economy has been rather weak compared with the rest of the world. It was highly appreciated that the international community took measures to stop further high yen.



Information sharing includes sharing of correct information by Japanese and western media as well as accurate, trustworthy, timely information from the Japanese government. One reason why Japanese citizens were extremely confused about the Fukushima atomic plant issue at the beginning was the fact that information became snarled.



Moreover, the author simply could not understand nor believe when she was informed from one of her online friend in Canada (initiator to raise 5 million dollars to save Japan) who kindly provided with all the information he had with agility, that western sources have been communicating online that Japan no longer needs assistance from abroad, when the situation here is desperate. She believes there was a kind of misunderstanding and/or miscommunication; however, this kind of things should be avoided. This issue really made her depressed, when many kind messages she received from online friends around the globe made her feel better.



All media and individuals need to be responsible of sharing information in an appropriate manner. We should share only the facts, what we know and feel that is logical and rationale, whose source of information is trustworthy.





In the next article the author hope to briefly introduce what experts around the globe (Japan and overseas) estimate as possible effects of the natural disaster on the economy, global and Japan.