Mikhail Mishustin: “In the conditions of external restrictions, it is essential to act in an extremely determined way, to expand our own competences, improve industrial facilities, and ensure that all our technical systems and complexes, and the high-tech equipment we use for space activities is highly competitive.”
Mikhail Mishustin’s opening remarks:
Mikhail Mishustin holds strategic session on development of space industry
Mikhail Mishustin holds strategic session on development of space industry
Mikhail Mishustin holds strategic session on development of space industry
Colleagues, good afternoon.
Building up the national space industry’s capabilities is one of the objectives set by President.
Today, we will consider ways to promote its further sustainable development. Space exploration is crucial to ensuring consistent growth of the national economy and strengthening Russia’s technological sovereignty. Its performance directly reflects on the living standards of the population in every region of our vast country.
In the conditions of external restrictions, it is essential to act in an extremely determined way, to expand our own competences, improve industrial facilities, and ensure that all our technical systems and complexes, and the high-tech equipment we use for space activities is highly competitive.
As a result, both individuals and businesses across the nation will have access to high-quality communication services, fast internet, weather forecasting, high-precision navigation, as well as detailed surveying of the Earth’s surface – in other words, all the services that have become an indispensable fixture of modern society. It goes without saying that these systems must function without failures.
We are currently at the stage of finalising and adjusting strategic plans for Russia’s space activities with the Roscosmos state corporation, in line with the President’s instructions.
The latest version of the national project will include breakthrough initiatives that can give a powerful impetus to the development of scientific thought and pave the way for industrial growth for decades to come.
These include programmes for fundamental study of space objects.
We will also continue manned flight programmes, which should become more productive in terms of practical purposes.
Importantly, we also need to accelerate the construction of an entirely Russian orbital station, a versatile platform for testing new technologies and carrying out unique scientific research projects. We expect that it will be able to operate without permanent human presence.
Furthermore, to deploy our own multi-satellite constellations, we will need to establish assembly lines for mass production of spacecraft. This can be accomplished through a significant reduction of their weight and dimensions and a transition to new standardised platforms. It is also essential to reduce labour intensity of this industry.
One of the most important challenges today is the need to drastically reduce the cost of putting payloads into orbit. We expect our designers, engineers and scientists to come up with out-of-the-box technical solutions, such as versions of reusable spacecraft or fundamentally different systems with innovative properties that will radically change the conventional idea of space launch methods.
All these plans are resource-intensive. According to expert estimates, a total of more than 1 trillion roubles will need to be allocated for the next three-year period to accomplish them. In the horizon until 2036, the figure will be about 4.5 trillion.
The scale of upcoming works will require an extremely well-thought-out use of all available national resources. We need to thoroughly analyse the commercialisation of products and services and ensure stable demand for them. This will create favourable conditions for pooling the efforts of the state and the business community. What is very important, this will make it possible to attract private investment into this sphere.
Consequently, they will start opening numerous technological start-ups, new design bureaus and innovative production facilities.
It is necessary to drastically improve the level of project management, so that all companies would aim to achieve one common result. Doubtless, we need to expand inter-departmental integration for this purpose. We need to introduce a flexible system for determining specific goals and clearly chart priorities in terms of deadlines and results. This will allow us to focus our efforts on strategic aspects in conditions of limited resources.
We should pay special attention to making the industrial sector more cost-effective; it would be appropriate to introduce centralised planning tools and those for monitoring the activity of specialised enterprises. Absolutely all production programmes should be synchronised, and we should rule out any duplication of works and surplus capacities. The issue of expanding production processes is among the most important aspects, including for the space industry.
Of course, people who will have to implement these plans are our resource. In the long run, the achievement of various goals will depend on their knowledge, professionalism and dedication.
The space programme is on the threshold of highly complicated scientific and technical objectives. Extremely skilled young specialists will have to accomplish them. We need to implement additional measures for attracting talented young people into companies and enterprises. On the whole, we are now actively training engineers. With this in mind, we are also building a modern educational infrastructure across the nation and creating favourable conditions for students and researchers.
Colleagues,
We are planning to launch our new initiatives in early 2026, after finalising them and securing the President’s approval.
Today, it is important that all of us once again closely analyse proposed systemic approaches towards launching comprehensive work in this sphere, while prioritising the role of international cooperation, especially with friendly BRICS states and those of the Global South.
These decisions will serve as an initial position for strengthening leading positions of the Russian space programme.
