China's economy is changing. The country has relied on manufacturing, heavy industry and raw industrial development since it first kicked off a phase of explosive growth in the 1980s . But like Japan and South Korea before it, China has reached the limits of this export-led model and must now adjust to new conditions. Since the Mao era, steel production has driven economic growth in the country, feeding into other industries and, more recently, helping to undergird the real estate boom . In 2006, however, China's steel production began to outstrip domestic demand, forcing Beijing to look for new markets and for a way to align supply with demand. The structure of the steel industry has made this quite challenging. Thousands of tiny, local firms scattered across the country produce the majority — 66 percent — of China's steel.