An illuminated sign switches to “go” and a car inches forward to draw level with a counter cut into the wall of a white one-storey building.

The driver lowers the window and is greeted by a smiling woman framed in the hatch.

But instead of ordering a cheeseburger and fries, he clasps his hands in prayer before leaning over to sign his name on a tablet computer and raising a pinch of ceremonial incense offered by the smartly dressed attendant to his forehead.

Welcome to the 21st century world of funerals in Japan.

This week, a company in Ueda, a small sleepy city famed for its apples and peaches in the mountains of central Nagano prefecture, launched what they claim is the world’s first funeral drive-through service.

In a country with a shrinking population, where the death rate far outstrips the birth rate, the new service economises the sometimes lengthy but profoundly important ritual of easing the dead into the next world.

It enables the elderly and immobile to see off their close friends and family from the comfort of their cars, streamlining what can be a service running for several hours into a simple - and less physically taxing - affair lasting just minutes.