BEIJING — China's service outsourcing market saw a contraction in the first quarter amid the unprecedented challenges brought by COVID-19, data from the Ministry of Commerce showed.

Chinese firms inked service outsourcing contracts worth about 237.3 billion yuan (about $33.52 billion) in the first quarter, down 18 percent year-on-year, while the executed contract value stood at 161.04 billion yuan with a year-on-year decrease of 10.6 percent.

Of the total, offshore service outsourcing contracts reached 147.89 billion yuan, 17.9 percent lower from a year earlier.

A 28 percent year-on-year growth has been registered in the offshore fulfilled service outsourcing contracts of the medical and biotechnology sectors.

Digital services also saw burgeoning demand amid the epidemic, with the fulfilled service outsourcing contracts of cloud computing up 16.2 percent and those of e-commerce platforms up 14.5 percent.

About 95 percent of service outsourcing enterprises have resumed work as of mid-April, said the ministry.