BEIJING, March 9 -- China's inflation remained tame last month with a mild year-on-year consumer price increase and a slight drop in costs for goods at the factory gate, official data showed.

China's consumer price index (CPI), a main gauge of inflation, rose 1 percent year on year in February, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said Thursday.

The figure was lower than the 2.1-percent increase recorded in January, according to an NBS statement. On a monthly basis, consumer prices dropped 0.5 percent, reversing the 0.8 percent increase in the previous month.

Dong Lijuan, a statistician with the NBS, attributed the mild inflation to retreating market demand after the Spring Festival holiday in January and ample goods supply.

Compared to January, food prices, especially that of the staple meat pork and vegetables, played the main role in dragging down the overall price level. Non-food prices also inched down, with falling costs in travel, cinema tickets, and services like haircuts and housekeeping.

The country's core CPI, deducting food and energy prices, climbed 0.6 percent from a year ago last month, down from 1 percent seen in January, Dong said.

The data came days after China announced the target of keeping the CPI increase at around 3 percent in this year's government work report, the same as the goal of last year. The country's consumer prices grew 2 percent from a year earlier in 2022.

The NBS data also showed that China's producer price index (PPI), which measures costs for goods at the factory gate, went down 1.4 percent year on year and remained flat on a monthly basis in February.

"As the production recovery of industrial enterprises accelerated and market demand improved last month, the PPI remained flat month on month," Dong said. "But owing to the high comparison base from the same period last year, the year-on-year decline continued."