TOKYO (BLOOMBERG) - McDonald's Holdings Japan will offer French fries in small sizes only from Friday (Dec 24) after flooding at a Vancouver port and the coronavirus pandemic have cut off supplies of one of its key offerings.

While the fast-food chain is trying to address the problem with alternative flights and is cooperating with suppliers and importers, it will offer only small-sized French fries from Friday to Dec 30.

Elimination of the medium- and large-sized offerings was necessary "to ensure that as many customers as possible will have continued access to our French fries".

McDonald's hopes that supply issues that will affect its 2,900 outlets in Japan will be resolved by New Year's Eve and said the move won't affect its hash brown offerings. Customers will get a 50 yen (60 Singapore cents) discount on set items to reflect the smaller portion.

Set items at McDonald's come with a medium size portion of French fries and customers have the option of increasing or decreasing the size.

At 74g and 225 calories a serving, the small size is about half the portion of the medium offering.