Russia Drafts New Space Exploration Strategy

From Ria Novosti: Russia Drafts New Space Exploration Strategy
Russia’s Federal Space Agency Roscosmos has submitted to the government a draft of a space exploration strategy until 2030, Kommersant business daily reported on Tuesday.

The ambitious program prioritizes a step-by-step modernization of the space industry, development of new spacecraft including space shuttles, and active exploration of solar planets.

“The goal of the strategy is to ensure that the Russian space industry maintains its world-level standards and solidifies its position among the top three space powers,” Kommersant cited the text of the document.

According to the draft, Russia must increase its share of the global space market to 10 percent by 2030, compared to only 0.5 percent in 2011.

The Russian space industry must be able to build satellites and spacecraft using only domestically-manufactured components, especially electronics, by 2020.

By 2030, the Russian orbital satellite clusters must meet up to 95 percent of the domestic demand for services in civilian and defense sectors.

Russia is planning to carry out several space exploration missions, including a piloted flight to the Moon with landing on its surface and sending probes to Venus and Jupiter.

“In cooperation with foreign partners Roscosmos plans to deploy a network of permanent research stations on Mars,” the document says.

Russia will also intensify its efforts to remove “space junk” orbiting Earth and to protect our planet from asteroids and comets.

The future of the Russian space program
The ambitious program will be financed from the federal budget and private investments.

A special independent agency may be created under the Russian president to coordinate the country’s space policy, Kommersant said.

The Russian aerospace industry has faced a series of misfortunes over the past year, including the loss of three Glonass navigation satellites and the Phobos-Grunt Mars probe. Both officials and independent experts agree that the industry needs deep reforms.