Chinese President Xi Jinping on Monday called for new engines to revitalize northeast China's old industrial base amid the "new normal" of economic development.

The region should foster clusters of emerging industries by means of innovation-driven development as well as optimization and upgrading of industrial structure, he told lawmakers from northeast China's Jilin Province in a panel discussion during the annual session of the National People's Congress (NPC).

He urged deeper reform to break institutional bottleneck and release great vitality of the country's traditional manufacturing base, which has seen slow economic growth these years.