The global impact of a terrible disaster

Most of us can remember where we were when the planes struck the World Trade Center.
I have a suspicion that the scale of the human and economic damage done by the Japanese earthquake and tsunami means that it will take on a similar significance as one of the defining events of the early 21 st century.
Right, now, all the focus is rightly on the appalling human suffering apparent in numbing images of wholesale destruction across Japan’s north east coast.
But sooner or later – I suspect sooner in this always-on connected world – the focus will shift on to the social, economic and technological implications of an irresistible natural disaster.
We will notice the economic impact here fairly shortly. With Toyota, Nissan and Honda having shut car plants and electronics manufacturers like Sony also halting production it may well be that the supply of these goods in the UK and the rest of the world at least falters for a while. That has implications for dealers and retailers.
There could also be implications for overseas production if any of their chains of suppliers export certain components to satellite production facilities in places like the UK.
UK firms who do business with Japan may also find contract decisions get delayed for sometime as their Japanese customers try to assess the impact of the tsunami on their own economy and resources.
On the resource front, it may well be that the prices of some raw materials falls in the short term as a major consumer like Japan suffers a temporary loss in production capacity.
In the long term, those resources look likely to rise again as Japan’s resource consumption will climb heavily when it begins the process of reconstruction.
The nuclear industry will face new questions and new engineering challenges as it absorbs the lessons of what has happened to the plants at Fukushima Daiichi.
Geologists, civil engineers and planners will assess the best ways to construct communities exposed to the terrible power of earthquakes and tsunamis – and to warn them of impending disaster.
The very fact that the Japanese disaster was on our screens within hours of it happening means it is not a localised problem far away.
Its implications look likely to be felt for years to come.

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