Supertyphoon menaces businesses in flood-hit southwest Japan

Sep 05, 2020 | News On Japan

Sep 05, 2020 (Nikkei) - A powerful typhoon threatening record-breaking wind and rain for Japan has put companies and transportation networks on high alert, with some moving to cut operations starting this weekend.

Supertyphoon Haishen has drawn comparisons to a 1959 storm that battered the nation's Pacific coast, leaving more than 5,000 dead or missing.

In an unusually early series of warnings, weather authorities have been urging "maximum alertness" for days ahead of a possible landfall on southwestern Japan's island of Kyushu on Sunday or Monday. Companies have started taking precautions, with the experience of recent deadly floods fresh in mind.

Yamato Transport, the country's top home delivery company, canceled operations in Kyushu for all or part of Saturday, Sunday and Monday, depending on the location. Sagawa Express has called off parcel pickups across the island on both days.

Supply chains are under threat in Kyushu, which serves as a manufacturing base for companies in industries as diverse as electronics, shipbuilding and food.

Canon has called off production at factories in Kyushu on Monday. Mitsubishi Heavy Industries has told workers at shipyards in Nagasaki, Shimonoseki and Hiroshima as well as other facilities not to report to work that day.

In the retail sector, industry leader Aeon is boosting inventories at supermarkets in Kyushu and Okinawa to prepare for possible interruptions in deliveries. Seven-Eleven Japan, the country's top convenience store chain, has prepared plans for rolling shutdowns of about 1,000 stores in the typhoon's path.

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