Combo photo taken on June 25, 2020 shows Zongzi, a sticky rice dumpling wrapped up with bamboo or reed leaves, in Hepu County, south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. (Xinhua/Zhang Ailin)

To further standardize food and cosmetic packaging requirements and reduce excessive packaging, Chinese regulators said that they will revise the standards that were published on August 10, 2021.

The revised version was open for public comment from Tuesday, in a bid to further limit the excessive packaging of mooncakes and zongzi, in accordance with the national green and low-carbon development requirements, said the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT).  

Mooncakes are traditional food for the Mid-Autumn Festival, usually in September, and zongzi are eaten for Dragon Boat Festival, usually in June.

In the revised requirements for restricting excessive packaging for food and cosmetics, the MIIT is requiring that there should be no more than three packaging layers for mooncakes and zongzi from August this year, down from four layers in the previous version.

Enterprises should take measures to control the cost of packaging, except those in direct contact with the contents, and the packaging should not exceed 20 percent of the sales price of the product. Mooncakes and zongzi should not be packed with precious metals, mahogany or other valuable materials.

The requirements restricting excessive packaging will be mandatory national standards to curb extravagance and eliminate luxury packaging. 

China published the most recent version of the requirements in August 2021, and they will come into effect on September 1, 2023, according to a document seen on the website of State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR).

But in order to curb the excessive packaging of mooncakes and zongzi as soon as possible, the implementation date for the new provisions will be August 1, 2022, according to the revised version.

Mooncakes should not be packed with other goods, and zongzi should not be packed with goods that exceed the value of the zongzi. In 2005, the SAMR stipulated that mooncakes should not be bundled with other commodities.

According to research, China's packaging waste accounts for about 30 to 40 percent of the urban household garbage. And most of the packaging waste was generated from excessive packaging, said SAMR in September, 2021.