China's economy continued to recover in May from the shocks generated by the COVID-19 epidemic as major economic indicators showed improvement, the National Bureau of Statistics said on Monday.

Industrial output expanded 4.4 percent year-on-year last month, 0.5 percentage points faster than the previous month.

Retail sales dropped 2.8 percent year-on-year, but contractions narrowed 4.7 percentage points from April's decline.

Fixed-asset investment in the first five months contracted 6.3 percent year-on-year, recovering from a 10.3 percent decline in the first four months.

Meanwhile, the country's service production index turned positive in May, up 1 percent year-on-year. This compared with a 4.5 percent decline in April, showing the service sector is on a path to recovery.