Macquarie supports Australian involvement in space exploration

Macquarie University's Australian Centre for Astrobiology (ACA) has supported a recommendation by a new consortium of Australian space-related organisations that the Federal Government help maximise Australia's involvement in the future of space exploration by setting up an Australian space agency.

Director of the ACA, Professor Malcolm Walter, says Australia will fall far behind the rest of the world unless it acts now.

"Thirty-five countries have space agencies, including Singapore, Thailand, Taiwan, China, Japan, India, Brazil, and every Western nation - except us. Who's out of step?" Walter says.

Formed in April last year, the Australian Space Network (ASN) is a group of nine private and public stakeholders including the ACA at Macquarie University, several CSIRO divisions, the Australian Space Industry Chamber of Commerce and a number of private technology companies. It has been developed with the assistance of the NSW Department of State and Regional Development, and was recently publicly backed by Australian astronaut Andy Thomas.

The network's aim is to bring the country's space professionals and companies together to compete for NASA and European Space Agency contracts worth billions of dollars. But with US President George Bush recently outlining his vision to "take the next step" in space exploration, and committing billions in NASA funding over the next five years, ASN Executive Officer Philip Young says the time is ripe for the Australian government to coordinate its space program nationally.

"We would benefit enormously from participating in the bigger space endeavours that are going on in the world, and even the smaller things that are going on in Australia - we don't promote them well, we don't get the maximum advantage either for the people doing them or for the nation as a whole," Young says.

Item provided courtesy of Macquarie University