That hope is shared by officials at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach.

Port officials say exports from the U.S. may increase in the form of lumber and equipment to help Japan rebuild after the earthquake.

"So it’s not clear that overall we’ll actually have less trade with them this year and maybe this slowdown will pick up and accelerate and we may have as much or more trade later in this year," Wong said.

Port officials say it will be weeks if not months before they will know exactly how the earthquake in Japan has affected imports and exports, and it may be much longer than that before trade with Japan is back to the same level as it was before.