A single grave may not exceed one square meter in Beijing, Beijing Youth Daily reported Thursday.

The city will cut the land of graves before it becomes "filled with them in a few years," according to Beijing Civil Affairs Bureau.

According to the municipal funeral regulations issued in 1996, graves for one or two boxes of ashes can be one square meter and more than two boxes can be three square meters. The regulation will be revised this year.

The city has to provide graves for 80,000 boxes of ashes every year, a major problem due to limited land.