China to enforce niversal cell phone charger to reduce technical waste :

Just came accross the following news in EETimes:

China will start to enforce a compulsory universal cell
phone charger standard this month. All cell phones designed after June 14
must adopt the universal charger interface, based on USB, otherwise they will
not be approved for sale in China, according to the Ministry of Information
Industry, which is responsible for enforcing the rule.

The goal is to reduce the number of chargers that are thrown away each year
because of cell phone upgrades. Nearly 100 million cell phones are replaced
every year in China, according to MII.