"The earthquake and tsunami destroyed factories and totally crippled production and supply operations. We are very certain that industrial output in March and April will plunge," said ministry official Naoki Tamura. The ministry has yet to release projected output data following the March 11 disaster, he said. But economist Hiroshi Watanabe from private economic think tank Daiwa Institute of Research said Japan's industrial production in March could drop 10 percent from a month earlier. "Production has simply stopped since the earthquake. Many factories cannot operate due to enormous damage after the quake and tsunami," Watanabe said. Since the disaster, many major Japanese companies, including Toyota Motor Corp. and Sony Corp., have been forced to suspend production due to a shortage of components. Toyota, the world's No. 1 carmaker, halted its entire auto output in Japan from March 14 to 26 -- a production loss of 140,000 cars.