BEIJING — China's industrial production continues to gain momentum, with strong performances in the high-tech and equipment manufacturing industries, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) on Jan 18.

The country's value-added industrial output, an important economic indicator, went up 2.8 percent year-on-year in 2020, data from NBS shows.

The growth accelerated from a 2.3 percent rise registered in the first 11 months of last year, according to the NBS.

Industrial output grew 7.1 percent year-on-year in the fourth quarter, topping the third quarter's figure by 1.3 percentage points.

December alone saw output growth rise to 7.3 percent, up 0.3 percentage points from November and hitting its highest point since March 2019, NBS data shows.

The value-added industrial output measures the activity of designated large enterprises with an annual business turnover of at least 20 million yuan (about $3 million).

By ownership, the output of state-controlled enterprises climbed 2.2 percent in 2020, the output of joint-stock companies went up 3 percent, and the output of overseas-funded enterprises rose by 2.4 percent.

The manufacturing sector's output climbed 3.4 percent year-on-year in 2020, the fastest growth among the three major sectors: manufacturing, mining, and the production and supply of utilities.

The mining output edged up 0.5 percent year-on-year, and the production and supply of utilities reported year-on-year growth of 2 percent.

The industrial structure continued to improve last year, with the outputs of high-tech manufacturing and equipment manufacturing industries respectively expanding by 7.1 percent and 6.6 percent.

The industrial and supply chains are basically stable, and more industries are seeing their outputs grow, said NBS head Ning Jizhe.

In 2020, major enterprises in 25 out of 41 industries saw their value-added industrial output grow, Ning said.

Jan 18's data also shows improvements in other economic indicator readings. China's gross domestic product expanded 2.3 percent year-on-year in 2020 to about 101.6 trillion yuan.

The total retail sales of consumer goods, a major indicator of consumption growth, grew 4.6 percent year-on-year in the fourth quarter, 3.7 percentage points higher than the third-quarter figure.