Of all the arguments that have been forwarded against the impending photographing and fingerprinting of foreigners upon arrival in Japan, the one that strikes me as the most ill-thought out concerns the increase in waiting times in immigration queues. Immigration at Narita airport is lightning fast; so fast, in fact, that in the past few years I've frequently found myself waiting an interminably long time at baggage collection before my suitcase finally appears.
A chain is only as strong as its weakest link, so unless the good people at Narita can find some way of getting the bags off the plane, through security and onto the conveyer at least 15 minutes quicker, I can't see what practical difference some extra time in the queue is going to make.
My guess is that even after the fingerprinting and photographing regime commences, getting through Narita is still going to be much faster than in any other comparable airport -- a reality for which we can thank the Japanese penchant for actually providing a sufficient number of staff to do the work at hand.