A local education concern group on Monday welcomed the government's decision to form a task force to look into a recent gastroenteritis outbreak among students who went on a mainland study tour in Guangdong.

Education minister Christine Choi said the task force would review the arrangements of such trips, and liaise with their mainland counterparts.

Speaking on RTHK's Hong Kong Today programme, Mervyn Cheung, who chairs the Hong Kong Education Policy Concern Organisation, said the task force was necessary to ensure future school trips did not encounter similar problems.

"The task force is badly needed... because these kinds of exchanges or study tours for students are becoming more and more frequent and, at the same time, they are quite important in the curriculum for schools," Cheung said.

Cheung said the task force must look at existing regulations to see if they need to be changed or improved to ensure the health and safety of students on school trips.

"They need to review all the guidelines that are set for these kinds of study tours. And especially in relation to the vigilant maintenance of hygiene and safety standards for students during the tours... whether or not the existing provisions have already safeguarded the hygienic standards and the safety standards of the travel agencies that have been hired... all this should come under very strict scrutiny."