Walk into any Japanese noodle shop or restaurant and chances are high you'll soon be eating with a pair of disposable wooden chopsticks from China.

But not for long. In a move that has cheered environmentalists but worried restaurant owners, China has slapped a 5 per cent tax on the chopsticks over concerns of deforestation. The move is hitting hard at the Japanese, who consume a tremendous 25 billion sets of wooden chopsticks a year - about 200 pairs per person. Some 97 per cent of them come from China.

Chinese chopstick exporters have responded to the tax increase and a rise in other costs by slapping a 30 per cent hike on chopstick prices - with a planned additional 20 per cent hike currently pending.The increase has sent Japanese restaurants scrambling to find alternative sources for chopsticks, which are called "waribashi" in Japanese."We're not in an emergency situation yet, but there has been some impact," said Ichiro Fukuoka, director of Japan Chopsticks Import Association.

A pair of waribashi that used to cost a little over 1 yen ($0.01) now is 1.5-1.7 yen. The rising costs of raw wood and transportation because of higher oil prices have also contributed to the rise, industry officials said.

But pretty soon, some fear Japan won't even be able to get expensive chopsticks from China: Japanese newspapers Mainichi and Nihon Keizai reported that China is expected to stop waribashi exports to Japan as early as 2008.

To minimize the damage, Japanese importers now buy more bamboo chopsticks and are considering new suppliers, including Vietnam, Indonesia and Russia, said Fukuoka.

Convenience store operators try to cushion the impact through cost-cutting in distribution and transportation.

"We provide chopsticks only to customers who ask for them," said Mayumi Ito, a spokeswoman for Seven & I Holdings Co., owner of 7-Eleven convenience stores. "We're closely watching the development."

Disposable chopsticks produced by domestic makers accounted to half of the market share until about 20 years ago, but were taken over by cheaper and high quality Chinese counterparts, mostly produced by Japan-China joint venture.

Supporters of environmental cause see the development a chance to get rid of disposable chopsticks, which have been linked to deforestation and a wasteful lifestyle.

An Osaka-based restaurant chain operator Marche Corp. switched to reusable plastic chopsticks in February at all 760 outlets after testing various materials and a six-month tryout at one-third of its outlets, said company spokesman Michihiro Ajioka.

The chain still keeps waribashi in stock in case customers have trouble snaring noodles with plastic chopsticks, he said. Customers who bring personal chopsticks also get a small discount.