The March 11 triple disaster damaged or destroyed 7,254 companies on the coasts of Iwate, Miyagi and Fukushima prefectures, about one-third of the total in those areas, a credit research company said.

The 7,254 companies employed 77,000 people and had annual total sales of 1.8 trillion yen ($22.5 billion), or about 20 percent of all sales in those areas, according to Tokyo Shoko Research Ltd. (TSR).

TSR analyzed damage from the Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami on companies in Iwate and Miyagi prefectures through on-site inspections and aerial photographs.

The research firm also studied companies located within a 30-kilometer radius of the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant for stagnation in business activities.

“Given the damages to companies whose head offices are not located in the coastal areas or firms that are run by individuals, the real situation is more serious,” said Nobuo Tomoda, a senior researcher of TSR. “It is necessary to implement support measures for damaged companies as early as possible.”

The city of Ishinomaki in Miyagi Prefecture was hardest hit in terms of the number of companies that were damaged. A total of 1,749 companies, or 70 percent of local firms there, were inundated by the tsunami. The 1,749 companies employed 18,003 people, TSR said.

In Sendai, the capital of Miyagi Prefecture, 724 companies in Miyagino and Wakabayashi wards were inundated. In Kesennuma, also in Miyagi Prefecture, 717 companies, or 70 percent of the total, were flooded, according to TSR.

In Iwate Prefecture, 1,857 companies in eight coastal municipalities, including Kamaishi, were damaged in the tsunami, including 748 that were destroyed.

The 1,857 companies employed 18,631 people and accounted for 70 percent of the businesses based in those areas.

In Fukushima Prefecture, 2,207 companies, with 21,722 employees in total, were headquartered within 30 km of the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant. In Minami-Soma city, for example, 938 firms, or 92.5 percent, suffered physical or financial damage due to the earthquake, tsunami or accidents at the nuclear power plant, the TSR said.

Meanwhile, 86 companies had gone out of business by May 11, two months after the earthquake. The number of business shutdowns due to the triple disasters is increasing at a pace three times faster than that following the 1995 Great Hanshin Earthquake, according to the TSR.

BY EIJI ZAKODA, Asahi Staff Writer, May 17, 2011