Brussels, 08/11/2011 (Agence Europe) - The culmination of years of European financial efforts in the conquest of space that was the launch on 19 October of the first two operational satellites of the Galileo navigation system cannot hide the need to continue these efforts to maintain EU leadership in this field. The EU, then, is facing the major challenge of not disregarding space and its applications, which include the GMES surveillance system, as it drafts its annual budgets until 2020.
“For European Commission President Herman Van Rompuy, speaking about space is synonymous with holidays, we cannot quietly ignore the current economic and financial crisis which has not spared the space sector”, warned the head of the European Space Agency (ESA) Jacques Dordain, opening a space conference in Brussels on 8 November. He said that there were two major events ahead for European space policy. The first is agreement of the multiannual financial framework for 2014 to 2020, in which the member states will, in his view, have to prioritise continuation of the Galileo programme and support for the GMES, one of the EU's most ambitious space programmes so far. “We must work to make sure the second is one of the spearheads of the EU budget for the coming period”, he insisted. The second important event will be the ESA ministerial meeting at the end of 2012 which will be no less decisive for the budget its member states are willing to dedicate to space research. In 2008, ESA member states pledged investment of €10 billion, Dordain recalled, highlighting a 25% reduction in the cost of the Agency. (EH/transl.rt)