Japan Govt Promotes Food Trucks, Portable Restroom Trailers, Cardboard Beds for Evacuation Shelters

The Yomiuri Shimbun

15:43 JST, November 11, 2024

In order to improve conditions at evacuation shelters, the government is promoting the widespread use of portable restroom trailers, food trucks and cardboard beds, according to an outline of measures to quickly help people in disaster-hit areas. The measures are included in a comprehensive economic stimulus package that will be compiled within this month.

The government will also increase the number of stockpile sites to strengthen “push-type support,” which is to deliver aid supplies to disaster-hit areas without waiting for requests.

Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba has been insisting on the need to set up restrooms, kitchens for hot meals and beds at shelters within 48 hours, saying “We should make sure that those who are on the edge of despair [because of disasters] are in a good environment.”

In the economic package, the government will provide subsidies to local municipalities to secure such supplies as food trucks and portable restroom trailers. As food trucks are expensive and limited in number, the government will also develop a database to register private companies’ ownership, with the aim of speeding up dispatch.

Stockpiling for push-type support has been carried out so far only in Tachikawa, Tokyo. The government plans to increase the number of stockpile sites to about eight, including in Hokkaido, the Tohoku, Shikoku and Kyushu regions and Okinawa, to deliver supplies faster. The sites will include supplies such as cardboard beds, partitions and portable toilets.