BEIJING — The purchasing managers' index (PMI) for China's manufacturing sector came in at 51.9 in March, edging up from 50.6 of February, data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) showed on March 31.

A reading above 50 indicates expansion, while a reading below reflects contraction.

The rise came as factory activity recovered at a faster pace after the Spring Festival holiday, which fell in February this year, NBS senior statistician Zhao Qinghe said.

The sub-index for production stood at 53.9 in March, up 2 percentage points from a month earlier, while that for new orders rose 2.1 percentage points to 53.6, which indicates faster expansion of production and demand in the manufacturing sector.

The new export order and import sub-indexes also rose to 51.2 and 51.1, respectively.

The data also showed on March 31 that the PMI for China's non-manufacturing sector came in at 56.3 in March, up from 51.4 of February.