Three more economic indicators are pointing to the continued recovery of the U.S. economy, which is being led by growth in manufacturing, retailing and industrial production.

The combined value of distributive trade sales and manufacturers’ shipments for March was estimated at $1.07 billion, up 2.3 percent from February and up 11.9 percent from the same period last year, according to a U.S. Department of Commerce report.

Manufacturers’ and trade inventories were estimated at $1.33 billion, up 0.4 percent from February and up 5 percent from March 2009. Both figures are adjusted for seasonal and trading-day differences but not for price changes.

The report comes on news that industrial production in the United States rose in April by the most in three months. Output at factories, mines and utilities increased 0.8 percent, up from a 0.2 percent rise in March, while production at manufacturers rose 1 percent for a second straight month. The positive numbers indicate factories are still powering an economic recovery that’s becoming broad-based, Bloomberg reported.

“The manufacturing sector continues to sort of lead the way in the recovery,” Julia Coronado, a senior economist at BNP Paribas in New York, told Bloomberg. “Factories are “benefitting from the upswing in the inventory cycle, recovering global trade and the upswing in consumer spending.”

U.S. retail and food sales in April were up 0.4 percent from March and 8.8 percent from April 2009, according to a U.S. Commerce Department report. It was the seventh straight month of growth.

Perhaps the biggest sign of economic recovery is an increase in consumer confidence. The Thomson Reuters/University of Michigan preliminary index of consumer sentiment rose to 73.3 in May from 72.2 in April, though analysts surveyed by Bloomberg had, on average, forecast a reading of 73.5.