1st LD: Industrial output growth picks up

China's value-added industrial output, an important economic indicator, grew 6.2 percent year on year in November, picking up from the 5.6-percent growth recorded in October, official data showed on Saturday.

That represents the second-highest monthly growth this year, after June's 6.8 percent, pointing to tentative signs of improvement in the manufacturing sector.

Year-on-year growth in the first 11 months stood at 6.1 percent, unchanged from that for the first 10 months, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).

Industrial output, officially called industrial value added, is used to measure the activity of designated large enterprises with annual turnover of at least 20 million yuan (3.11 million U.S. dollars).

Industrial production accounted for 40.6 percent of China's total GDP in the first nine months of 2015, making it one of the leading indicators for economic growth.

The figure was released by the NBS with other major economic indicators for November and the first 11 months.

In breakdown, manufacturing output expanded 7.2 percent, 0.5 percentage points higher than the previous month. Mining output growth decelerated to just 0.3 percent, from 0.4 percent in October and 1.2 percent in September.

Meanwhile, the output of the electricity, heating, gas and water sectors picked up notably by growing 2.2 percent, from the 0.3-percent decrease recorded in October, the bureau said.

NBS figures also showed that industrial output in China's central regions rose 8.1 percent year on year last month, followed by 7.8 percent in western areas and 7.3 percent in eastern regions.

Industrial output in China's northeastern areas recovered slightly last month by dropping 2.5 percent, compared with the 4.6-percent decrease in October. Endi