BEIJING — China's industrial output maintained expansion for eight straight months as factories activities keep recovering under the government's effective COVID-19 control measures.

China's value-added industrial output, an important economic indicator, went up 7 percent year-on-year in November, beating market expectations, data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) showed on Dec 15.

The growth accelerated from a rise of 6.9 percent registered in October, according to the NBS.

On a month-on-month basis, industrial output rose 1.03 percent last month.

In the first 11 months, industrial output expanded 2.3 percent from one year earlier, 0.5 percentage points faster than the rise for the first 10 months, NBS data showed.

Among the bright spots are the equipment manufacturing and high-tech manufacturing sectors. The output of these two industries increased 11.4 percent and 10.8 percent, respectively, both markedly outpacing the overall growth in industrial output.

The industrial output is used to measure the activity of designated large enterprises with an annual business turnover of at least 20 million yuan (about $3 million).

The data on Dec 15 also showed improvements in other readings of economic indicators. China's fixed-asset investment went up 2.6 percent year-on-year in the first 11 months of the year, 0.8 percentage points higher than the rise in the first 10 months.

Retail sales of consumer goods, a major indicator of consumption growth, went up 5 percent year-on-year to 3.95 trillion yuan in November.