Government officials meeting earlier this week decided high copper prices were hurting China's economic development, the official China Securities Journal said.
"The meeting concluded that since China is a copper importer and prices aren't coming down and are having an unhealthy effect on China's economy, the government should use the adjustment power of its reserves and release some of its inventories to resolve the supply contradiction," the paper said.
It didn't specify the volume of reserves to be released or the timetable. Industry officials have estimated that the reserves bureau could release up to 80,000 tonnes of its roughly 200,000 tonnes of copper reserves to try to push down the high price of benchmark London copper futures.
Shanghai copper futures contracts have hit record highs repeatedly over past weeks.
The actions of the bureau and the size of its reserves are state secrets.