Back to business: post-disaster Japan

TOKYO — Even before the magnitude-9 earthquake and tsunami hammered Japan’s northeastern coast, the country’s economy had seen better days. Now weeks after the disaster, the idled factories, dead workers, delayed deliveries, fuel shortages and rolling blackouts pose a huge challenge for Japan Inc.

Few businesses have emerged unscathed. Tokyo Shoko Research estimates that more than 70 per cent of Japan’s 1,597 publicly listed companies were affected by the quake, tsunami, or nuclear crisis.

When auto parts suppliers’ factories went down, most of the country’s car and truck makers halted their assembly lines. Brewers Kirin, Asahi and Sapporo lost beer-making capacity, and computer-chip makers were left scrambling following the disabling of Shin-Etsu Chemical’s and Sumco’s semiconductor wafer-making operations.