U.S. industrial production fell by 0.2 percent in March after a 0.8 percent increase in February and a 0.4 percent decrease in January, the Federal Reserve reported on Tuesday.

The 0.2 percent decline in industrial production, an indicator of the output of mines, factories and utilities, was led by a 7.0 percent drop in output of utilities.

The big drop reversed a jump of 7.6 percent in output of utilities in the previous month as temperatures swung from below seasonal norms in February to above seasonal norms in March.

Output in the manufacturing sector, however, moved up 0.7 percent in March, the strongest showing since December. The increase followed a 0.1 percent gain in February and was led by advances in the production of durable goods.

Mining output, including oil production, also edged up 0.1 percent in March, compared with a gain of 0.3 percent in the previous month.

Overall industrial production for March was 2.3 percent above the level in the same month of 2006.

The rate of capacity utilization for total industry fell 0.2 percentage point to 81.4 percent in March. It was the same as its year-earlier level and 0.4 percentage point above its 1972-2006 average.