The future of Miyake Island may be as hazy as the smoke billowing from its volcano, but for Kazuyoshi Yamada, it comes before his own losses.

The 73-year-old municipal assemblyman fears the prolonged evacuation from Miyake, now in its third month, will lead to a permanent mass exodus of young people from the island about 180 km south of Tokyo.

"Now 33 percent of Miyake's population is 65 or over," he said. "I am worried that if the evacuation continues, many may decide not to return to the island, especially the young islanders.

"In fact, some have already moved their residence registration off the island."

Yamada voiced his concern in a question to Mayor Ko Hasegawa at an extraordinary municipal assembly session held last week in the western Tokyo suburb of Fuchu.

Life as an exile means the assemblyman of nearly 20 years has little time to attend to personal business.

He and his wife left the island on Sept. 3, settling into a house they own in Tokyo's Suginami Ward. But they soon moved into a public housing complex in Hachioji, western Tokyo, to show support for the other evacuees that live there.

Yamada's public duties resumed with courtesy calls to more than a dozen municipal offices in the greater metropolitan area that are hosting islanders.

Members of his constituency also call him to seek advice on life in an unfamiliar place and to confess their anxieties.

The veteran assemblyman said he recently received a call from an elderly couple he knew very well. They complained about their situation, likening it to virtual house arrest.

"They have been assigned (to live) in an odd place where there are no other islanders around," Yamada said, adding that the couple had never left the island, did not know how to use trains and were afraid of stepping out of the house.

He suggested that the couple move into his housing complex, where about 100 Miyake families live.

"I've lost 6 kg since I came here," Yamada said in explaining the toll the role of assemblyman in exile has taken on him.

But the ordeal is not a new one for Yamada. Lava from a similar eruption of Mount Oyama in 1983 buried more than 400 houses in the island's Ako district, including Yamada's house and grocery store.

"It was the biggest store on the island," he said. "You cannot tell how big the shock was, to lose everything one had built during his whole life."

Being a municipal assemblyman, however, he could not dwell upon his loss.

After staying for a while at a relative's house on a part of the island unaffected by the eruption, he went back to a public gymnasium to share life at a shelter with fellow villagers.

He went to daily meetings of the village assembly to discuss recovery measures for the affected area, and "went around bowing" to other communities unscathed by the eruption to thank them for their cooperation and support.

In the meantime, his wife worked hard to start their grocery business from scratch at a new location, as the old land was made useless by hardened lava. The Yamadas managed to reopen their store one month later.

Last summer's eruption occurred at a time when the business of the whole community, as well as Yamada's, had finally returned to normal.

"This time, the store is intact, but all the commodities we stocked were rendered useless," he said. "Such a loss. . . . Insurance does not cover it."

Nevertheless, his responsibilities to fellow villagers seem to overshadow personal anxieties. He said his immediate concern is how the evacuees will bear up this winter, as many did not expect the evacuation to last this long.

"Most of the islanders left with few belongings. They have no winter clothing," he said. "I wonder if there is any way for them to return to the island temporarily to fetch things."

Currently, the island is a no man's land as poisonous gas -- up to 50,000 tons of sulfur dioxide daily -- spews from Mount Oyama.

Tokyo Gov. Shintaro Ishihara said in late October that it was impossible to return to the island, even temporarily, criticizing as "careless" a remark by Meteorological Agency head Koji Yamamoto that such trips were not entirely impossible.

Meanwhile, Yamada remains concerned that the prolonged evacuation will only accelerate the depopulation of the island.

"I know I sound pessimistic, but we may face a population decrease so rapid that it may lead to community breakdown," he said.