China Steel Corporation (CSC) is the largest integrated steel maker

Steelmaking

Steelmaking is the second step in producing steel from iron ore. In this stage, impurities such as sulfur, phosphorus, and excess carbon are removed from the raw iron, and alloying elements such as manganese, nickel, chromium and vanadium are added to produce the exact steel required.-Older...

 in Taiwan

Taiwan

Taiwan , also known, especially in the past, as Formosa , is the largest island of the same-named island group of East Asia in the western Pacific Ocean and located off the southeastern coast of mainland China. The island forms over 99% of the current territory of the Republic of China following...

. Its main steel mill

Steel mill

A steel mill or steelworks is an industrial plant for the manufacture of steel.Steel is an alloy of iron and carbon. It is produced in a two-stage process. First, iron ore is reduced or smelted with coke and limestone in a blast furnace, producing molten iron which is either cast into pig iron or...

 is located in Siaogang District, Kaohsiung

Kaohsiung

Kaohsiung is a city located in southwestern Taiwan, facing the Taiwan Strait on the west. Kaohsiung, officially named Kaohsiung City, is divided into thirty-eight districts. The city is one of five special municipalities of the Republic of China...

. The corporation and its sister companies are administrated under the CSC Group. According to the International Iron and Steel Institute

International Iron and Steel Institute

World Steel Association, often abbreviated as worldsteel, is the international trade body for the iron and steel industry. The association represents approximately 180 steel producers , national and regional steel industry associations and steel research institutes...

 (IISI), China Steel is the 25th largest steel producer in the world in 2006.

History

China Steel was planned and organized in 1960s and the corporation was officially established on December 3, 1971. On November 1, 1974, CSC began the first stage of construction. Its head office was located in Taipei

Taipei

Taipei City is the capital of the Republic of China and the central city of the largest metropolitan area of Taiwan. Situated at the northern tip of the island, Taipei is located on the Tamsui River, and is about 25 km southwest of Keelung, its port on the Pacific Ocean...

 between 1971 and 1975, but translocated to Kaohsiung since September 15, 1975.

The first blast furnace

Blast furnace

A blast furnace is a type of metallurgical furnace used for smelting to produce industrial metals, generally iron.In a blast furnace, fuel and ore and flux are continuously supplied through the top of the furnace, while air is blown into the bottom of the chamber, so that the chemical reactions...

 was launched on June 27, 1977. A few months later, the first stage of the building plan of the steel mill was accomplished. The second and the third stage were subsequently accomplished in 1982 and 1988, respectively. Presently, the company has a total of four blast furnaces.

CSC was started as a non-governmental company. It once transformed into a state-owned company on July 1, 1977 and subsequently re-privatized on April 12, 1995. Although CSC is a de jure non-governmental company at present, the Government of Taiwan still owns a large portion of its stocks

Stocks

Stocks are devices used in the medieval and colonial American times as a form of physical punishment involving public humiliation. The stocks partially immobilized its victims and they were often exposed in a public place such as the site of a market to the scorn of those who passed by...

, thus the chairman of company is appointed by the government.