Steel plants around Beijing have been told to scale back production to ensure blue skies for a September 3 parade to mark the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II and the National Day holiday in October, according to the mysteel.com website.
From late August to early September, steel plants in neighboring Hebei and Shanxi provinces will cut production by 30 percent. From late September, steel plants within 100 kilometers of Beijing will stop work, it reported.
China's northern Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region had eight cities on the top 10 most badly polluted last year, according to the Ministry of Environmental Protection.
Similar restrictions were put in place last November for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meetings in the capital.
More than 10,000 plants in Beijing, Tianjin, Hebei, Shanxi, Inner Mongolia and Shandong either stopped or cut production, giving rise to skies described as "APEC blue."
