Baosteel Group Corp, China's biggest steel maker, will buy 8 percent of Zhanjiang Port Group Co to facilitate imports of raw materials for the 10-million-ton steel plant it's building in Guangdong Province.

Zhanjiang, the nearest Chinese port to Australia, can handle as much as 200,000 tons of iron ore and 300,000 tons of crude oil, Shanghai-based Baosteel said in a statement on its Website Thursday.

Baosteel received government approval in March to start work on its Zhanjiang plant, which will increase total steel making capacity by a third to meet rising demand. The project could cost 60 billion yuan (US$8.8 billion), Chairman Xu Lejiang said in April.

Zhanjiang Port is spending 4 billion yuan to expand the port, including building two docks for containers, Baosteel said. Baosteel is building two berths for receiving pellets. The mill didn't say how much the investment would cost or who the seller of the stake is.