enterprising spirit that they had to use the rebuilding as an opportunity to draw a blueprint for new growth. mr. sankei ( tomitaro ) hara, who led the rebuilding of yokohama, said that while yokohama had been burned to the ground, the fire was not able to touch the spirit of the people. if i may refer to his words again, he also said that yokohama city had become a blank slate, and from a blank slate anything was possible. you can draw the latest picture by incorporating new culture. i would like to conclude by sincerely wishing that rebuilding in the affected area will make the same kind of steady progress that was made in yokohama following the great kanto earthquake, and that the economy in the affected areas ends up even better placed with greater growth potential. thank you for your attention. the proportion of the population of tokyo that died in the earthquake or remained unaccounted for thereafter was in the range of 2. 0 – 3. 0 percent. bis central bankers ’ speeches

kiyohiko g nishimura : the current state of japan ’ s economy and monetary policy stance speech by mr kiyohiko g nishimura, deputy governor of the bank of japan, at a meeting with business leaders in kanagawa, kanagawa, 21 april 2011. * * * introduction more than a month has now passed since the great east japan earthquake. the disaster claimed many lives and many people are still missing. i would like to express my sincere condolences to the victims of the disaster. moreover, many continue to face severe hardship, and i would like to offer my heartfelt sympathy to all of those who are suffering. even in kanagawa prefecture, many people have been affected by the disaster, due, for example, to rolling blackouts. i appreciate being given this opportunity to speak and to exchange views with government and business leaders in the prefecture, despite these difficult times. and i would like to express my gratitude for your cooperation with the various business operations of the bank of japan ’ s yokohama branch. before we start to exchange views, let me talk about developments in economic activity and prices in japan, taking into account the effects of the disaster, and about the bank of japan ’ s response following the earthquake. i. developments in the global economy before outlining developments in japan ’ s economy, let me first discuss developments in the global economy. in the first half of 2010, the global economy continued to recover from the sharp downturn caused by the financial crisis triggered by the failure of lehman brothers in the autumn of 2008. however, the pace of recovery slowed temporarily during the summer and autumn of 2010 and the recovery seemed to be pausing at one point. in the early phase of economic recovery following major downturns, we can often observe a sharp rebound as inventories, for example, are restored to previous levels. thus the slowdown in 2010 was attributable to a tailing - off of this strong rebound, combined with the fact that the effects of various demandboosting measures, such as subsidies for car purchases, implemented in many countries as a means of addressing the financial crisis, had almost run their course. nevertheless, from around the end of the autumn of 2010, the global economy exited this temporary deceleration phase and its growth rate has since been increasing again. looking at developments by region, growth in emerging and commodity - exporting economies started accelerating in the autumn of 2010. at present, in addition to high growth in household consumption