Wang Dongfeng, head of the Communist Party in the Chinese province of Hebei, has announced that Hebei, China’s top steelmaking region, will cut 14 million mt of steelmaking capacity both this year and next year in order to tackle poor air quality, according to a report by Reuters.
Speaking at the National People’s Congress in Beijing, Mr. Wang also said the province would reduce its concentration of PM2.5, a lung damaging particulate matter, by at least five percent compared to 2018 levels. At the same meeting, Hebei governor Xu Qin said that the province had eliminated 82.23 million mt of annual steel capacity in 2013-18, while the number of steel companies operating in Hebei had been halved over that period. Mr. Xu said that by the end of 2020 the total steel capacity cut by Hebei will be equivalent to that of the world’s second-biggest steel-producing country (India, according to the World Steel Association)..
China achieved its goal of cutting 150 million mt of steelmaking capacity by 2020 ahead of schedule in 2018.