It’s safe to say that the outlying areas of where the earthquake & tsunami hit are getting back to a regular pace. Most grocery stores have meat, vegetables, Milk, and eggs (though slightly at a higher price), People are regularly attending work again (though some never even stopped), and on the whole everything is up to about 85%. That said, it is not 100% and there are some things to watch for as we head into the next weeks and months ahead. The primary area of concern is, “what all was in the affected areas?” The image I have is either small coastal towns or farm land and certainly we all watched the tsunami wipe out both.

What I’m getting at is this. Japan isn’t so large that a majority of essential businesses can be replicated all over (as in redundancy) and thus for the whole of Japan to work every region has to be producing equally. However this recent catastrophic event has turned Japan on it’s head with long term problems that plague the nation all through out the year. Here are just a few examples I can see.

Issue 1: With a death toll of over 10,000 people (estimated), and a even greater amount missing, that’s a potentially sizable  portion of the workforce for Tohoku which may have included doctors, workers, or specialists.  Their loss could be felt in a number of different ways.

Issue 2: The Japan Times reports Tohoku coastal-area job losses are estimated to be over 81,500 in total. This isn’t jobs that need to be filled in Tohoku, but jobs that no longer exist anymore due to there being no businesses, factories, or schools to work at anymore. Those displaced workers who survived will need to find jobs in already densely populated areas like Tokyo, Osaka, etc. causing demand for resources to further rise.

Issue 3: If theoretically a demand in resources rise there would have to be an equal supply to meet demand. If the demand is electricity use for say air conditioners & fans to combat Tokyo’s notoriously hot & humid summers, but electricity is in short supply then another issue will be how people will cope and how that will affect the social & economic welfare of the country then.

Issue 4 & others: How people will cope with potential permanent shortages or long term shortages, what industries contributed what to manufacturing that no longer are operational, with plants closed will other companies pick up the slack effectively (i.e. Beer producing plants in Fukushima down- will other plants double production to fill the gap? what additional resources will that take?), The clean up of the affected region, Property rights (Who owns/can buy a property-lot full of debris if the owners are missing or dead?), etc.

There has been a huge out pouring of generosity from the world to Japan and Japan is very thankful for it. What remains yet to be seen is what long term problems will there be (either by the bureaucracy, supply problems, etc.) and how this nation will cope through each one.

However it goes, I remain hopeful for the future of this country

~J

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