Mandatory plan to shut 80m tons of steel capacity

China will eliminate 80 million metric tons of steel and iron production capacity in the next five years, with Hebei province accounting for 60 million tons and Shandong province for 20 million tons, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said on Thursday. The government will pursue the sector's structural adjustment, especially in Shandong, Hebei, Liaoning, Jiangsu, Shanxi and Jiangxi provinces, a ministry official said. At end of 2012, the industry's capacity utilization ratio was only 72 percent. Forty percent of steel and iron companies lost money in the first half of this year.

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