BEIJING — China's papermaking industry reported steady output growth in the first four months of the year, official data shows.

The country's machine-made paper and paperboard output totaled 44.31 million tons from January to April, according to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.

The reading was up 0.3 percent from the same period in the previous year, said the ministry.

During the period, operating revenue of major papermaking firms expanded by 2.3 percent year-on-year to 477.01 billion yuan (about $71.09 billion), the data showed.