The impact on our business [of the disaster] was felt in all regions. Nissan’s manufacturing operations are thoroughly global in nature, and disruption to the supply structure in Japan spread quickly through our supply chain all around the world. In the past months Nissan has been implementing countermeasures in every region where it does business.
In Europe, for example, where we maintain production bases in the United Kingdom, Spain and Russia, we took steps immediately after the quake to ensure supplies of needed parts. The European regional team worked closely with the Japan side to share information about the status of the Japan-sourced parts supply, swiftly reflecting these updates in the regional supply side. The level of depth and accuracy of this information sharing has been truly amazing. It has allowed us to constantly update our regional production forecast, so that we can align our production calendar with conditions in production sites in Japan.