Have you ever thought about it? The distant conflicts in the Middle East can directly impact a bag of frozen dumplings or a bottle of seasoning sauce on supermarket shelves.

At present, Japan is experiencing a real supply chain crisis. There are no exaggerated natural disasters or extreme food production declines—just the instability in the Middle East has plunged Japan's food industry into collective anxiety: insufficient packaging, soaring raw material costs, halted product sales, and a new wave of food price hikes is already set for this summer.

Visible stockouts: dumplings out of stock and condiments out of supply

Currently, many food companies across Japan are struggling to withstand the pressure of packaging material shortages and have been forced to reduce production or suspend sales.

A dumpling manufacturer in Kawagoe City, Saitama Prefecture, announced that nearly 100 stores will remove refrigerated dumplings from shelves starting this month. The issue isn’t a shortage of dumpling fillings or flour, but rather the unavailability and soaring prices of plastic trays used to hold the dumplings. Forced to adapt, the brand has shifted to producing bagged frozen dumplings that don’t require trays.

Not only frozen foods, but also sauce manufacturers in Hiroshima have announced the discontinuation of several condiments, with the primary reason being the shortage of plastic packaging containers. Additionally, staple daily necessities such as natto and bread have quietly adjusted their prices in response to rising packaging costs.

The shelves are quietly emptying, prices are steadily rising, and a silent food inflation is spreading across Japan.

Understanding the underlying logic: Why is there a war in the Middle East and Japan lacks plastic?

Many people wonder why the war is far away in the Middle East, and why is it holding the neck of Japanese food packaging? The logic of this industry chain is straightforward and heart wrenching:

Middle East conflict → Strait of Hormuz shipping blocked → Japan's crude oil imports plummet → Shortage of naphtha supply → Price increase of plastic packaging raw materials → Pressure on food companies

Here is a key raw material that is easily overlooked - naphtha.

It is a light oil processed from crude oil and a core raw material for manufacturing plastic pallets, food packaging bags, and sealed containers. And Japan's naphtha has a high degree of external dependence: 60% relies on imports, of which over 70% comes from the Middle East.

After the outbreak of the Iran conflict, energy transportation routes were blocked, and the price of naphtha increased by as much as 66%, almost doubling. The insignificant rise in chemical raw materials will ultimately result in all costs being passed down the industry chain to downstream food companies.

The survey data from Japanese private industry groups bluntly reveals the current situation of the industry, and the data is real and glaring:

1. 44.1% of the surveyed companies are currently affected by a shortage of packaging materials;
2. 31.4% of enterprises predict that they will face a supply crisis in the next three months;
3. 72.5% of enterprises have explicitly stated that they will pass on costs through price increases;
4. 35.3% of enterprises plan to discontinue the sale of some low profit products.

The fatal weakness of the island nation's supply chain

A conflict far away in the Middle East has exposed Japan's most fatal weakness: high scarcity of resources and high dependence on external industrial chains.

Without independent and controllable energy, without sufficient chemical raw material reserves, even a small plastic tray can easily affect the entire country's food market. The shortage of shelves and rising prices may seem like fluctuations in the prices of daily food, but in essence, they are the inevitable compromise of resource weak countries in geopolitical games.

In the current era of tightly intertwined globalization, no country can stand alone. The distant artillery fire will eventually turn into rising price tags in supermarkets, which is the most real economic chain reaction.