By James Pomfret, Kevin Yao and Ellen ZhangHONG KONG/BEIJING (Reuters) - Facing its deepest economic challenges in years, China's leadership has tasked ministries and local governments with implementing a new mantra from President Xi Jinping: unleash "new productive forces". Beijing hopes the “new productive forces” campaign will strengthen China at a time when geopolitical pressures including steps by the United States to “decouple” or “de-risk” have curtailed access to foreign technology. "To support innovation, we should give people more freedom to think and talk, because many innovations result from the collision of ideas. The new mantra was also taken up by China's state planning agency, the National Development and Reform Commission. Its annual report on Tuesday pledged support for industries including satellite internet applications, China's BeiDou Navigation Satellite System, and research into nuclear fusion.

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Persons: James Pomfret, Kevin Yao, Ellen Zhang HONG, Xi Jinping, Li Qiang, Xi’s, Xi, Tianchen Xu, Li, Steve Tsang, Ellen Zhang, Nick Macfie Organizations: Communist Party, Party, Reuters, Economist Intelligence Unit, SOAS China Institute, National Development, Reform Commission Locations: Ellen Zhang HONG KONG, BEIJING, China, China’s, Beijing, United States, London, Pearl