Hundreds of steel workers were displaced last year when seven steel angle bar manufacturers shut down their milling plants amid the influx of cheaper but substandard imports from China, according to an industry association.

Steel angle bars are right angle?shaped solid steel used for trusses, roof frames, steel frames, steel structures of billboards, transmission towers, bridges, sheds and other structures.

In a news briefing in Makati City, Henry Leungson, vice president of the Steel Angles, Shapes and Section Manufacturers Association of the Philippines Inc., said only two companies?Lunar Steel Corp. and Cathay Metal Corp. - operated their mills in 2008, at below their capacity levels.

Leungson said the capacity utilization rate among the nine registered local manufacturers of steel angle bars dropped to just 10 percent in the past three years, because of the entry of imported products from China that do not meet local standards.

He said companies such as 21st Century Steel Mill Inc., Dragon Asia Rolling Mills Inc., Legacy Steel Corp., Maxima Steel Mills Corp., Philippine Nails and Wires Corp., Primary Steel Corp. and Unicorn Metal Corp. were forced to stop production of steel angle bars last year or shifted to manufacturing of other steel products because of unfair competition posed by imported products.

This translated into loss of hundreds of jobs, representing more than half of the workers of the industry, said Ramon Tan, an executive of Lunar Steel Corp. Roderick T. dela Cruz