Employees of China Railway Engineering Equipment Group work at the assembly shop for shield tunneling machine in Zhengzhou, Central China's Henan province, on March 18. [Photo/Xinhua]

China has made considerable progress in speeding up production and resumption of work, as over 76 percent of small and medium-sized companies had restarted work as of Saturday, according to the nation's top industry regulator.

Xin Guobin, vice-minister of industry and information technology, said about 98.6 percent of large-scale companies in China have restarted production, with 89.9 percent of employees having returned to work.

SMEs are also accelerating steps to restart work, and their work resumption rate has been rising 1 percentage point a day on average since the start of March, Xin added.