U.S. Firm Sends Chopsticks to Japan
A Minnesota factory on Tuesday shipped its first truckloads of chopsticks to Japan, a venture the company president acknowledged would remind some of “taking coals to Newcastle.”
A crowd of about 100 visitors and 45 workers was on hand to applaud the first shipment from the high-tech Lakewood Forest Products Ltd. plant in northern Minnesota’s depressed iron mining country.
“It’s just kind of festive here today,” said Dorothy Ylatupa, the plant secretary. “We’re passing out chopsticks and instructions on how to eat with them.”
The Japanese discard 130 million pairs of disposable chopsticks daily, a volume that has put a strain on the country’s traditional, labor-intensive manufacturing methods, said Ian Ward, president of Lakewood.
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