The employment rate of Chinese secondary vocational school graduates reached 96.85 percent in 2012, according to a Thursday statement from the Ministry of Education.

As many as 3 million secondary vocational school graduates, or 57.6 percent of the country's total 6.6 million such graduates, get employment in the service sector. The proportion was four percentage points higher than the 2011 level, the statement said.

Those who were employed in primary and secondary industries accounted for 8.94 percent and 33.4 percent of the total graduates.

As of the end of 2012, there were 12,663 secondary vocational schools in China, with 21.13 million students, according to the ministry.