Information Releases

Corporate Attitudes towards Business Continuation Planning (BCP)

Only 15.5% of businesses have formulated BCPs
— Over half of all businesses are cognizant of earthquakes. This percentage is higher in regions where large-scale earthquakes are expected —

Introduction

In recent years, increasing emphasis has been placed on the importance of forming pre-disaster prevention and mitigation and response measures, etc., to be implemented during and after disasters so that business activities can either continue unabated or be restored quickly, by anticipating how business activities will be affected when businesses encounter states of emergency such as natural disasters like earthquakes, typhoons, and torrential rains, etc.

Therefore, Teikoku Databank conducted a survey on corporate attitudes towards Business Continuation Planning (BCP). This survey was performed in conjunction with the June 2016 TDB Trends Research.

*Survey Period: June 17th - 30th, 2016; Companies Researched: 23,606; Valid Responses: 10,417 (Response Rate: 44.4%)

*Details of this survey can be found on the dedicated Economic Trend Survey HP. (http://www.tdb-di.com).

Primary points of survey results(summary)

  1. 1 51.8% of the companies view that “earthquakes” are the disasters they are conscious of the most during the work. Furthermore, 19.5% of the companies cited “fires” and 7.7% of the companies cited “floods,” - more than 80% of the companies cited natural disasters. A large numbers of companies cited “earthquakes” especially in regions where large-scale earthquakes are predicted, such as “Kochi Prefecture,” “Shizuoka Prefecture,” “Wakayama Prefecture,” “Ehime Prefecture,” and the “Tokyo Metropolitan Area.”
  2. 2 Only 15.5% of the companies indicate that they are “taking measures” with respect to Business Continuation Planning (BCP). Even when companies that indicated they are “currently taking measures” and are “considering measures” were both included, the total was still less than half of all businesses. Businesses with fewer employees have made less progress in taking measures, with companies having “no more than 5 employees” being 10 times less likely than companies having “over 1,000 employees” to take any measures.
  3. 3 With regard to measures relating to human resources at disasters, 63.7% of companies indicted that they themselves “employed” persons who could act in place of managers (representatives) when such managers were in short supply. However, this number was only 42.9% among companies having “no more than 5 employees,” such that said companies would have trouble staying in business in cases where managers were in short supply.
  4. 4 Most companies (82.7%) indicated that they use “mobile phones and mobile e-mail” to confirm the safety of their employees when states of emergency occur in their companies. This was followed by “landline telephones (include public telephones), and FAX,” and “IP phones and PC e-mail.” The most common measures against earthquakes were “measures to prevent equipment from falling (such as securing said equipment, etc.)” with 33.7% of the companies taking such measures, followed by “stockpiles of food,” and “subscriptions to property and casualty insurance policies.” Over 40% of the large companies indicated measures such as “evacuation drills,” and “stockpiles of food.”
  5. 5 39.4% of the companies indicated that they keep cash and deposits equivalent to at least 1 months’ worth of sales in case of disaster, which they would need in order to sustain cash flow after emergencies occur. However, many companies had less than 1 months’ worth of cash and deposits, which means they may lack the funds they would need during disaster recovery and emergencies.
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