TOKYO - Japanese authorities have urged the public to refrain from hoarding emergency supplies, after panic buying led to shortages of some essential goods following the release of a “megaquake” advisory.
On online shopping sites operated by Amazon.com and Rakuten, products such as drinking water, emergency toilets and preserved foods quickly rose in the best-selling rankings. Some items have already sold out.
At some stores of the DIY store chain Cainz, water, backpacks with disaster kits, and goods to prevent furniture from falling over have sold out. The trend has been especially pronounced in central Japan, one of the areas where a potential massive quake is expected to strike.
At a Tokyo supermarket on Saturday, a sign was put up apologising to customers for shortages of certain products it attributed to “quake-related media reports”.
Supermarket chains including Ito-Yokado have limited sales of drinking water to 12 two-litre plastic bottles per family to discourage stockpiling.
A local beverage firm reported a higher-than-usual increase in water orders, while a spokesperson from a company manufacturing liquid formula for newborns said, “We may need to consider ramping up production if sales continue to rise.”
The Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries shared a guide on social media about food stockpiling, calling on people not to hoard. Instead, it suggests they should buy slightly more than usual on a daily basis, consume older goods first and then replenish their stock.
Anxiety grew further after an earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 5.3 jolted areas near Tokyo on Friday night. The national weather agency said it appeared not to be linked with the chance of a massive quake occurring from the Nankai Trough in the Pacific, which had prompted the advisory issued the day before.
The latest quake, which struck at 7.57pm on Friday, was centred in western Kanagawa Prefecture, about 10 kilometres underground.
It came after the Japan Meteorological Agency on Thursday issued its first-ever advisory about higher-than-usual risk of a Nankai Trough megaquake.
The advisory was released after a magnitude 7.1 quake rattled southwestern Japan, with its focus located in the waters off Miyazaki Prefecture, on the western edge of the Nankai Trough. Some property damage was seen and 14 people were reported injured.
The Nankai Trough is an area that authorities have been monitoring closely for decades. A megaquake there could surpass the damage from the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami that devastated the northern coast of the main island of Honshu, experts have said.
Another earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 6.8 struck northern and northeastern Japan on Saturday, but no tsunami warning was issued.
Despite its relatively large size, the quake did not cause severe jolting or tsunami as its focus was deep, about 490km underground, off the coast of the northernmost main island of Hokkaido.