The supermarket group Asda has said it hopes to create up to 10,000 new jobs this year.

It said the new jobs will be mixture of full and part-time posts, and would be come from new store openings and from expanding facilities within existing outlets.

The company also announced it had seen strong sales growth over the festive period.

Asda is the UK's third largest supermarket chain and is owned by the US retail giant Wal-Mart.

Getting bigger

Of the 10,000 posts it hopes to create, Asda said about 30% would be full-time positions.

Asda currently employs about 120,000 people, and last year took on 16,000 more workers.

The company said it would be continuing its expansion programme which would involve the opening of about 10-12 new stores.

But many of the new jobs will come from the opening of new specialist on-store facilities, including pharmacies, opticians and photo developing centres.

The move reflects the influence of its US parent Wal-Mart which already offers such services in its own stores.

Christmas sales

Asda also announced that it had seen buoyant sales over the Christmas trading period.

It said sales growth excluding petrol at stores which have been open at least a year was in the 'low teens' which it claimed "was more than double that of its closest competitor".

General merchandise and clothing sales grew by 30%, and it said food sales growth "did not disappoint."

Earlier this week the UK's biggest supermarket chain Tesco reported a 6.2% rise in sales over the festive season, while sales at rival Sainsbury's rose by 6.8%.