chopsticks & the forest

"Environmentalists in China have a message to Olympic-goers in Beijing: Bring your own chopsticks!" This is how All Things Considered started this segment yesterday afternoon. I love it, what's it all about!? Apparently, disposable wooden chopsticks are dramatically contributing to China's deforestation. According the Greenpeace, the nation uses 160,000 pairs of chopsticks a day. This is equal to about 100 acres of forest being deforested each day! To enforce reusable chopsticks, the government is now taxing disposable chopsticks in an effort to discourage people from using them, most significantly the big chain restaurants. 

Last weekend, a friend had a post-Chinese New Year pot luck. Signed up to bring a good salad in order to balance out the greasy chinese food and at the last minute remembered my bright red set plastic chopsticks.

Also forgot to post last month that China has also banned plastic bags because it's depleting their petroleum reserve. I have to say, China is pretty rockin' in this arena.