BEIJING — China's cultural industry reported improving revenue last year as the COVID-19 epidemic was largely subdued and the country's economy gradually restored its strength, official data shows.

The combined revenues of companies in the sector amounted to 9.85 trillion yuan (about $1.53 trillion) in 2020, up 2.2 percent year-on-year, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).

The figure reversed the 0.6 percent drop in the January-September period, bouncing back into positive territory, the NBS noted.

Among the cultural industry's sub-sectors, the revenues of news information services and creative design services logged double-digit growth in 2020, up 18 percent and 11.1 percent respectively from a year ago.

Emerging business models integrating the internet with cultural businesses saw revenues surge 22.1 percent year-on-year, up 0.2 percentage points from the first three quarters of 2020, said the NBS.