WASHINGTON, Jan 2: The US steel industry is in collapse and looking for a massive government investment programme of up to $1 trillion to stimulate demand for the key commodity, a report said on Friday.

Output of steel has plunged 50 per cent since September after posting record profits as construction and auto production have fallen sharply amid a US recession and the global credit crunch, The New York Times reported.

Industry executives are pleading for a huge public infrastructure investment programme -- of up to $1 trillion over two years -- under president-elect Barack Obama’s proposed stimulus plan, the newspaper said.

“What we are asking,” said Daniel DiMicco, chairman and chief executive of the Nucor Corporation, a giant steel maker, “is that our government deal with the worst economic slowdown in our lifetime through a recovery programme that has in every provision a buy America’ clause,” the newspaper quoted him as saying.

Economists in the Obama camp have said that the president-elect will propose to lawmakers a stimulus plan that will include significant infrastructure spending that draws on heavy industry.

The steel industry can spring back to life through construction of highways, bridges, electric power grids, schools, hospitals, water treatment plants and rapid transit, industry executives told the New York Times.

“We are sharing with the president-elect’s transition team our thoughts in terms of the industry’s policy priorities,” Nancy Gravatt, a spokeswoman for the American Iron and Steel Institute, was quoted saying.

The industry decline accelerated in November and December.

By late December, output was down to 1.02 million tons a week from 2.1 million tons on August 30, according to American Iron and Steel Institute figures cited by the newspaper.

The price of a ton of steel has fallen by half in recent months.—AFP