BEIJING - Preliminary statistics show that China created more than 12 million new jobs in cities and towns this year and kept the registered urban unemployment rate below 4.6 percent, Yin Weimin, minister of human resources and social security, said Thursday.

Speaking at a national conference on human resources and social security, Yin said China's pension insurance system would cover 300 million people in rural and urban areas by the end of this year, with about 85 million senior citizens claiming their pensions every month.

According to the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security (MOHRSS), China's social security funds that insure pension, medicare, unemployment, work-related injury compensation and maternity pay collected 2.35 trillion yuan ($372 billion) in revenues this year, up 24.7 percent year-on-year.

Meanwhile, spending by social security funds will rise 21.5 percent from a year ago to 1.8 trillion yuan this year, according to MOHRSS data.

Across the country, 24 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities raised their minimum wage standards by an average of 22 percent  year-on-year in 2011, the minister said.

Labor law enforcement helped 1.29 million migrant workers recover 2.94 billion yuan in defaulted salaries and compensation this year, he added.