The head of the agency, Josef Aschbacher, called it a "great success"PARIS, November 23.
/tass/. The Council of Ministers of the European Space Agency (ESA) has agreed to allocate €16.9 billion for the development of the European space program in the next three years. This was announced on Wednesday at a press conference in Paris by the head of ESA, Josef Aschbacher.
"We didn't get the amount we asked for, but it's worth considering the context. We received €10.3 billion in 2016, €14.5 billion in 2019, and now during the Council of Ministers we have received €16.9 billion, which represents an increase of 17%," he said. "This is a great success, demonstrating the understanding in Europe of the importance of the space industry," Ashbacher stressed.
As expected, out of the total amount, €2.7 billion is intended to finance space exploration programs, a similar amount will be directed to Earth observation programs, €2.8 billion is planned to be spent on the development of launchers, in particular on the modernization of Ariane 6 and Vega-C rockets.
The Minister of Economy, Finance, Industrial and Digital Sovereignty of France, Bruno Le Maire, welcomed the decision of the Council of Ministers, which includes representatives of 22 states. He noted that France has allocated €3.25 billion out of almost €17 billion to the budget.
