- July 22, 2008
- Posted by: EARSC
- Category: EARSC News
On 21 – 22 July 2008 an informal meeting of European ministers for space affairs was held at the European Spaceport in Kourou. The event was organized by Valérie Pécresse, the French Minister for Higher Education and Research and its objective was to prepare the decisions to be made at the next Space Council, a joint meeting of EU competitiveness ministers and representatives of the European Space Agency (ESA) Member States, set to take place on 26 September 2008.
As a successful example of EU’s space policy project, GMES was one of the issues discussed during the meeting. The European Commission affirmed that before the end of 2008 a communication about GMES will be addressed to civil society.
Although the creation of a European Centre of Research on Climate Change to optimise the use of the satellite’s data and to bring together European climate change researchers was initially suggested, it was finally agreed that no new institution is needed but the EU shall aim at enhancing the coordination between the already existing institutions.
All the participants agreed also that the EU should expand its space policy which will contribute to the EU competitiveness on the long run. The increase of the budget devoted to space research will be, however, the main obstacle for the implementation of this ambitious EU space strategy.
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Source GMES.Info