China's service outsourcing industry reports robust expansion

China's service outsourcing industry saw robust expansion in the first four months of this year, the Ministry of Commerce said.

This was reported by The Xinhua News Agency.

Chinese firms inked services outsourcing contracts worth a total of nearly 781.43 billion yuan (about 110 billion U.S. dollars) in the four-month period, up 14.4 percent year on year, according to the ministry.

The executed contract value stood at 520.51 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 12.9 percent.

Of the total, the value of offshore service outsourcing contracts rose 8.6 percent year on year to 419.04 billion yuan.

In the January-April period, the industry welcomed about 301,000 new hires, with 84.7 percent of these individuals holding a university degree or above.

Outsourcing refers to hiring an outside party to carry out services or produce goods typically undertaken by in-house employees.