China's national standard watchdog issued compulsory standards for the production of disposable chopsticks on Monday.

The standards for producing wood and bamboo disposable chopsticks respectively are enacted to ensure product quality and save wood, said an official with the Standardization Administration of China (SAC) at a press conference held on Monday.

According to the standards, wood disposable chopsticks could only be made of birch, poplar and other widely-planted trees. And the standards encourage makers to use bamboo which grows much faster than trees.

The standards limit the water content ratio of the bamboo chopsticks within 10 percent to prevent must and ban the use of chemicals that are harmful to human health.

Li Zhonghai, head of SAC said at the press conference that as most of the disposable chopsticks in China are made of leftover materials of the lumber industry, it is not necessary to ban their production and use.

Chopsticks are eating utensil in China and some other Asian countries. China produces around 45 billion pairs of chopsticks a year.

(Xinhua News Agency October 11, 2005)