The employment market in 100 Chinese cities continued to improve in the first quarter, the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security said Friday.

Employers filled 5.52 million job vacancies via the public employment service agency during the January-March period, up 7 percent from the previous quarter, ministry statistics showed.

Compared with the same period last year, job vacancies in the first three months rose 18 percent, the ministry said.

Job-hunters entering the job markets in the cities totaled 5.3 million in the first quarter, less than the 5.52 million vacancies.

The manufacturing industry accounted for the most job vacancies in the first quarter and demand for manufacturing workers accounted for one third of the 5.52 million job vacancies.

Vacancies in wholesale and retail trade, hotels and catering, household services, leasing and commercial services, together with the construction industry jobs, took up 47.9 percent of total labor demand in the first quarter, the ministry said.

In its job data released earlier this month, the ministry said the urban unemployment rate in the first quarter fell 0.1 percentage point to 4.2 percent from the 2009 full-year figure, with 9.19 million people registered as unemployed.