KAMAISHI, Iwate Prefecture--Nippon Steel Corp. put reconstruction of this devastated coastal city, long synonymous with its name, ahead of its own after the Great East Japan Earthquake.
KAMAISHI, Iwate Prefecture--Nippon Steel Corp. put reconstruction of this devastated coastal city, long synonymous with its name, ahead of its own after the Great East Japan Earthquake.
On July 1, steam plume rose from the stack of a thermal power station that stands on the former site of Nippon Steel's blast furnace for the first time since the March 11 disaster.
"Plume is a barometer of reconstruction," a longtime resident said. "Nippon Steel determines Kamaishi's reconstruction and its future."
Kamaishi has long been known as a city of steel since 1880, when the government opened a steel mill. The mill was acquired by Nippon Steel's predecessor in 1934.
Japan's top steelmaker did not begin to resume its own full-scale operations until April after it concentrated on the city's reconstruction. Its steel mill was restarted on April 13.
"Given the feelings of residents, we could not think of giving priority to recovering our facilities," said Masashi Tanida, head of Nippon Steel's Kamaishi Works. "We have lived here with the community. We only did what we were supposed to do."
Nippon Steel provided relief supplies for residents trucked in from its steelworks in Oita, Nagoya and elsewhere, including food, clothing, medicines and batteries, within days after the disaster.
It also rented a former factory site as a storage space for debris and rented a building for use as a temporary morgue.
The company opened Kamaishi Works' large bath to evacuees on March 21. It also provided a playground for temporary housing for 400 households.
Kamaishi Mayor Takenori Noda said he cannot thank Nippon Steel enough for the support it provided.
But Noda is well aware that his city cannot continue to rely on the steelmaker, since Nippon Steel has actually scaled back its operations in Kamaishi in recent years.
Kamaishi Works, which used to be an integrated steel mill, produces only wire rods for reinforcing tires. The blast furnace, the key piece of equipment that produces pig iron from iron ore, stopped its operations in 1989.
Today, Kamaishi Works employs only about 250 people, a fraction of the nearly 8,000 on its payroll in the 1960s. The city's population has also halved from a peak of about 90,000.
"We have dwindled because we relied too much on the steelworks," a senior official of a neighborhood association said.
The city government has persuaded more than 10 companies, including major pneumatic control systems maker SMC Corp., to set up shop in Kamaishi. But these companies were also damaged by the tsunami that devastated the city.
Takahiro Sasa, a city government official in charge of attracting companies, said, "We will proceed with a reconstruction plan with determination to attract companies from scratch."
Nippon Steel's Tanida said operations at the Kamaishi Works will recover to pre-disaster levels in August. He said the company plans to contribute to Kamaishi's reconstruction by creating jobs.
Kosuke Motani, a Development Bank of Japan official familiar with cities that developed with large companies, said it is unlikely that Nippon Steel will withdraw from Kamaishi because the Tohoku region offers a good labor force.
But Motani also said Kamaishi must promote job-creating industries such as tourism because manufacturers are not expected to create large numbers of jobs due to automation.
(This article was written by Osamu Mikami, Kaname Kakuta and Ryo Shimura.)