Nowadays, it has become a habit for consumers to go to restaurants and pack up the leftovers. So how about the quality and safety of packed lunch boxes? Professor Dong Jinshi, vice president and secretary general of the International Food Packaging Association, revealed that in recent years, China has used about 654.38+0.5 billion disposable plastic lunch boxes every year, and about half of them are qualified and unqualified products. The qualified rate of lunch box market in big cities such as Beijing, Shanghai and Tianjin is higher, which can reach more than 70%. Unqualified products mainly include foamed lunch boxes that have been banned for a long time by the state, inferior tableware made of toxic and harmful raw and auxiliary materials, and counterfeit lunch boxes marked with environmental protection and degradable words. /kloc-a ban on disposable foamed plastic lunch boxes was issued in 0/0. "Disposable foamed plastic tableware is listed as the eliminated product of China's industrial policy because of its high fire risk, easy poisoning when exposed to heat, difficult recycling, difficult decomposition and difficult landfill incineration." Professor Dong Jinshi said that in June 5438+099965438+ 10, the former State Economic and Trade Commission promulgated and implemented the Catalogue of Eliminating Backward Production Capacity, Technology and Products, requiring that disposable foamed plastic tableware be eliminated nationwide by the end of 2000. But today, there are still many enterprises in Zhejiang, Jiangsu, Guangdong and other places that continue to produce and sell. Some foamed products are added with fluorescent whitening agent with carcinogenic effect to cover up impurities, and some enterprises add toxic masterbatch to dye foamed products yellow. In 1980s, disposable foam lunch boxes made of polystyrene became popular on trains. This disposable lunch box has the advantages of low production cost, simple technology and profit rate of over 50%, which has attracted a large number of enterprises to invest in production. In recent years, China has developed and produced various fast food utensils such as polypropylene, starch, biodegradable plastics, pulp molding, plant fiber, cardboard and composite materials. However, because the cost is much higher than that of foamed plastic tableware, driven by huge profits, many enterprises are still willing to take risks in producing foamed tableware. The main raw materials of disposable foamed plastic lunch box are polystyrene and foaming agent. Polystyrene is a polymer of styrene. When it reaches 60 degrees Celsius, some free styrene monomer and some harmful substances will migrate out, causing harm to human body. Flammable gas such as butane is generally used as foaming agent, which is easy to cause fire; In addition, some take-away lunch boxes produced in violation of national standards will produce an unpleasant smell when they are filled with heated food. This is because the raw materials of the foamed lunch box use toxic substances released by waste plastics that do not meet the hygiene requirements, which will cause certain damage to the central nervous system of the human body. The cost of inferior disposable plastic lunch boxes can be reduced by 2/3. By the end of 2009, more than 980 disposable tableware manufacturers in China had obtained production licenses. But it is undeniable that there are still a large number of products produced by enterprises that have not obtained production licenses in the market. Some enterprises have only obtained a production license for one product, but they have printed license numbers on various products to deceive consumers; After obtaining the license, some enterprises use a large number of toxic and harmful raw and auxiliary materials such as industrial calcium carbonate, talcum powder and paraffin wax in their production, and even use waste plastics with unknown sources. Dong Jinshi pointed out that the cost of raw materials accounts for the largest proportion in tableware production, and it is safe to use food-grade raw materials to produce lunch boxes, while illegal enterprises will use industrial raw materials or waste plastics to produce lunch boxes in order to reduce costs. At present, each ton of polypropylene raw materials is about 654.38 million yuan. If industrial raw materials or waste plastics are used, the cost per ton is only about 5,000 yuan. If calcium carbonate, talcum powder and other auxiliary materials are used in large quantities, the cost of raw materials can be reduced by half. At present, the cost of good quality plastic lunch boxes is at least 0. 15 yuan, while the cost of inferior lunch boxes can be reduced to less than 50 cents. If inferior disposable plastic lunch boxes are used for a long time, toxic and harmful substances will dissolve in food, leading to indigestion, local pain and liver system diseases, which will seriously affect children's intellectual development and even lead to gallstones, heavy metal poisoning and even cell canceration. Nearly 80% of degradable lunch boxes are counterfeit products. On June 65438+February 2009 1, the General Technical Requirements for Disposable Plastic Tableware promulgated by China National Standardization Administration Committee came into effect. The standard defines plastic disposable tableware as "disposable tableware made of various thermoplastic materials", excluding paper tableware and tableware made of photodegradable materials applicable in the original standard, and clearly stipulates that the starch content of starch-based tableware should not be less than 40%, and the degradation rate of biodegradable lunch boxes should not be less than 60%. Dong Jinshi said that the "General Technical Requirements for Disposable Plastic Tableware" formulated the national standard for disposable plastic tableware for the first time, which ended the confusion that there was no standard for non-degradable tableware in the past and reduced the trouble for every enterprise to formulate enterprise standards. In the form of national standards, this standard recognizes the legal status of non-degradable plastic tableware for the first time, and also puts forward specific index requirements for degradable plastic tableware, which reduces the confusion brought to the market by enterprises blindly promoting degradable plastic tableware in the past. According to the investigation of the International Food Packaging Association, nearly 80% of degradable lunch boxes on the market are counterfeit products. In terms of cost, the cost of each degradable lunch box is 0.2 to 0.25 yuan, while the cost of each counterfeit degradable lunch box is only 0.07 yuan. Because the production cost is three or four times different, and some manufacturers pretend to be degradable lunch boxes based on consumers' preference for degradable lunch boxes, resulting in a mixed market for disposable lunch boxes. How to distinguish inferior disposable plastic lunch boxes? Dong Jinshi reminds consumers that the inner wall of inferior plastic lunch boxes is rough, astringent to the touch, soft to the touch, and will break when gently torn; Under the illumination, the box surface material has obvious irregular black spots, and white wax prints will appear when folded; The smell is pungent and even stings the eyes; It will deform when heated, and there will be oil leakage and water seepage; It is easy to sink into water after tearing, but the proportion of qualified products is less than 1 and will not sink. In addition, packed lunch boxes belong to food containers and must be marked with food quality and safety market access signs.