Steel industry faces difficulty

China's steel industry is confronted with serious overcapacity, sluggish demand, declining profits and stricter environment standards, an official said Wednesday.

To tackle the problems, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) has rolled out a batch of measures, including curbing newly added capacity and pushing industrial consolidation, said Feng Fei, a director with the MIIT.

The country aims to cut outdated steel production capacity by a total of 27 million tons this year, Feng said.