Local media report layoffs coming for 11,000 workers at Wuhan Iron & Steel

Local media are claiming Wuhan Iron & Steel Group, one of China’s largest steel mills, is planning to lay off as many as 11,000 workers, although the producer has denied the plans, The Financial Times reported. The reports follow an announcement in October of 100,000 lay-offs at Longmay, a struggling state-owned coal miner in northern China. The talk of downsizing at Wuhan Steel in the face of collapsing prices comes after a decade in which it consolidated smaller mills in central China, built a new mill in the country’s south and fought off attempts by state-owned Baosteel Group in Shanghai to dominate its market.