Manned spaceflight project costs China less than 20 bln yuan in 13 years

China's manned spaceflight project has cost little but accomplished much more - the project has spent less than 20 billion yuan in 13 years since it was established, said Xu Dazhe, deputy leader of the Shenzhou-6 manned spaceflight delegation and deputy general manager of China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation.

Xu Dazhe, on a visit to Hong Kong, said the development of our own manned spaceflight project is based on limited inputs. From Shenzhou-1 to Shenzhou-6 each spaceflight experiment was different in terms of condition and purpose and each must accomplish very distinct experiment results.

It was learned that of all the costs in developing China's manned spaceflight project about 8 to 9 billion yuan was not entirely used on the project. The frequency with which China launches satellites is little bit higher than in the past and the facilities used to launch these space satellites are all preserved in the Chinese Academy of Space Technology and China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology. The facilities are also used in manned spaceflight research.

Many of the facilities in the Beijing Aerospace City are of world's first class. These are all built with the manned spaceflight project budget. Actual expenses on researching and launching the spacecrafts are just over 10 billion yuan. China's aerospace project goes side by side with manned spaceflight project under a overall planning strategy .

Xu Dazhe said development of China's manned spaceflight cause is closely linked with China's economic development and growth of overall strength. Without sufficient economic strength it is hard to conduct relevant researches in the aerospace area, particularly the manned spaceflight project. China is one of the three countries capable of sending man into the space. It took China 13 years to reach this level, which proves that China's economic development and overall strength have improved considerably since the launch of reform and opening up.

By People's Daily Online