BEIJING, Mar. 25 -- China is expected to double its output of steel by the end of 2020, according to the executive director of Rio Tinto Plc, Sam Walsh.

The forecast was made partly based on the company's increasing sales of iron ore to China. Rio Tinto, the world's third-biggest mining company, sold 70% of its iron ore output to China last year, as compared with 50% in the previous year and only 16% in 2000, said Walsh.

China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology forecast that China's crude steel output this year would surge 10% as compared with the previous year.

In the first two months this year, China produced 103 million metric tons of crude steel, 25.4% more than in the same period of last year. According to MIIT, China eliminated about 100 million metric tons of iron-making capacity in 2009, and 11.29 million metric tons of steel making are expected to be eliminated by the end of 2011.