Mild rainfall has brought some relief to farmers in China's drought-hit areas. More precipitation is expected in the coming days, providing relief from a severe drought that threatened vital wheat crops in the country.

The capital city Beijing, which had not seen rainfall for over 100 days, enjoyed a steady cold rain on Thursday, as did several of the important grain-growing provinces in the northern and eastern parts of the country hit hardest by the worst drought in decades.

In Beijing, authorities have shot thousands of shells and rockets packed with cloud-seeding chemicals in a bid to spark rain across the region.

Liu Fenghui, a meteorological official in Miyun county, northeast of the capital, is in charge of artificial rain generation.

"Our job is to make the rain fall, or increase the precipitation volume. We need enough water vapour in the air and plenty of clouds as well."

The China Meteorological Administration said further moderate rain was expected across northern and eastern China, with it turning to snow in some areas as temperatures dipped due to a moisture-laden cold front.

China previously warned of a severe impact on the nation's winter wheat crop if no rain fell over the next two weeks.

In some provinces, such as Henan, Anhui, Shandong and Shanxi, authorities have declared the highest-level drought emergency, the first time the alert had ever been raised so high.