Officials in China are drawing up plans to axe between five and six million jobs over the next three years in a bid to curb oversupply problems and pollution, Reuters news agency reports.

Citing sources with ties to the country's leadership, the workers would be laid off in industries suffering from overcapacity, in what would be the country's biggest restructure in public spending in almost two decades.

It comes after the minister for human resources, Yin Weimin, said 1.8 million workers would be made redundant from the coal and steel industries.

Between 1998 and 2003, China made around 28 million workers redundant from state-owned enterprises, costing the government around 73.1 billion yuan (£8bn) in resettlement payouts.

The ministry for industry has not yet commented on the reports.