CHINA’S output of key industrial commodities, including coal and steel, continued to shrink in the first two months of the year amid chronic oversupply while crude oil production slipped as a global price slump took its toll.

    Economic activity data also remained weak in January and February, with factory output growth hitting the lowest since the global financial crisis, keeping pressure on policymakers to do more to avert a sharper showdown in the world’s second-largest economy.

    The government set an economic growth target of 6.5 percent to 7 percent for this year at the country’s annual parliament, the National People’s Congress, which will end this week.

    “China’s recent National People’s Congress provided some positive news for commodity markets by stimulating domestic demand and outlining structural reforms,” analysts with ANZ Research said in a commodities note Friday.

    “However, any policy support will likely be neutral for the steel and iron ore sectors.”

    Data from the country’s statistics bureau showed Saturday that crude steel output in January and February continued to drop, falling 5.7 percent year on year to 121.1 million tons, which helped to trigger a further 10.4 percent drop in the output of coking coal, a key steel-making material.(SD-Agencies)