Japan is preparing to join a growing wave of countries seeking to diversify oil export routes away from the Strait of Hormuz, planning to invest in pipeline projects abroad, with a particular focus on the Middle East.
According to a document produced by Japan’s economy ministry and reported by Bloomberg, the investment will come through Japanese companies in the form of risk-capital funding. Earlier this year, reports indicated that Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates had approached Japan about participating in the expansion of Middle Eastern oil pipeline networks as part of a broader push to shift crude flows away from the strait.
Before the war with Iran, Japan and its refiners depended on the Middle East for roughly 95% of all crude oil imports. The sudden loss of that supply forced refiners to scramble for alternatives and pushed the government to tap strategic oil reserves to offset the shortfall caused by disruptions through the Strait of Hormuz.
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As the conflict continued, Japan’s energy imports from the Middle East fell 67.2% in April compared with the same month in 2025. That April total, estimated at 3.843 million kiloliters of crude oil, marked the lowest monthly figure recorded since Japan began collecting this data in 1979.
Since then, Japan has worked to replace lost Middle Eastern supply with alternative sources while continuing to draw down its strategic reserves. The financial toll has kept climbing alongside global oil price swings; in June, Japan’s total oil import bill reached a record $89.46 billion, even though the actual volume of oil imported that month was 13.7% lower than a year earlier.
Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi said in June that this month’s oil imports into Japan are coming from sources that don’t rely on the Strait of Hormuz to reach the country, with the United States and Russia among those alternative sources, according to Japanese research firm Daiwa Institute of Research.
