A look at China's burgeoning space industry

Over the past decades, China has been deepening independent innovation in space technology, enhancing its comprehensive national strength.

The core module of the station named Tianhe.The Tianhe core module will be the management and control center and the main living space of the crew, and will support some scientific and technological experiments.Maps used for the octane render (https://visibleearth.nasa.gov/images/57747/blue-marble-clouds). Credit GettyImages

Space is critically important for a nation's military, economic and social development, making it a main frontier in modern global competition. Space technology plays a big role in military operations, improving reconnaissance, communication and command capabilities. It also underpins industries like satellite remote sensing, navigation and communications, all of which contribute to the steady advancement of a nation's strategic objectives. With major global powers increasingly venturing into space, it has become a new strategic high ground in international competition.

The U.S. Wolf Amendment, passed in 2011, banned the conduct of any China-U.S. joint scientific research related to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) or coordinated by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy without explicit authorization from the Federal Bureau of Investigation and U.S. Congress, and banned all NASA facilities from hosting "official Chinese visitors," thereby blocking China-U.S. space cooperation. 

In 1977, a delegation of Chinese space technology experts visited French aerospace research institutions, marking the end of China's long-standing "isolation" in the field of space and laying a solid foundation for future cooperation between the two countries.

In March 2021, China and Russia signed the Memorandum of Understanding on Cooperation in Construction of International Lunar Research Station, officially launching lunar exploration cooperation.

At the Global Space Exploration Conference in June 2021, the two countries jointly released the International Lunar Research Station Roadmap (V1.0) and the Guide for Partnership (V1.0), providing a detailed introduction to the concept, scientific goals, pathways and opportunities of the International Lunar Research Station—a set of experimental research facilities created on the surface and/or in the orbit of the moon, potentially involving other countries, international organizations and partners.

In 2024, China's Chang'e 6 probe successfully brought back the first samples from the far side of the moon. During this mission, Chang'e 6 carried four international payloads from France, the European Space Agency (ESA), Italy and Pakistan for different tasks.

China also engages in joint research and development (R&D) of space science and technology with other countries and shares the outcomes. For instance, China and Brazil established the China-Brazil Joint Laboratory for Space Weather to study the patterns of outer space weather changes in 2014. In 2017, two quantum science research teams from the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Austrian Academy of Sciences used China's quantum satellite Micius to achieve quantum key distribution between the two countries, laying a foundation for building a global quantum-secured communication network.

In China's Tianwen-1 mission, the country's first Mars exploration project, China collaborated with the ESA on engineering technology and with Austria and France on payloads. Additionally, it established a Mars probe data exchange mechanism with the U.S. and launched international payload cooperation for its asteroid mission.

As of 2024, China had signed over 200 space cooperation agreements with more than 50 countries and organizations.

At the same time, China's space industry is flourishing, with aerospace products and services expanding internationally. From 2019 to 2023, the scale of China's commercial space market grew from 800 billion yuan ($109 billion) to 1.9 trillion yuan ($260 billion).

In 2023 alone, China launched commercial carrier rockets 13 times and initiated around 170 financing cases in the commercial space sector, with total disclosed investments exceeding 18.5 billion yuan ($2.52 billion).

In addition, China supports many countries and regions with less advanced space technology through international cooperation. For instance, it has set up an emergency support mechanism for disaster prevention and mitigation using the Fengyun meteorological satellites, whose data are now used in 132 countries and regions.

In emergency monitoring for major disasters, China has consistently extended its assistance to affected countries. For example, during the severe drought in Afghanistan and the dam collapse in Laos in 2018, as well as the cyclone that struck Mozambique in 2019, China offered essential monitoring services. These services provided fundamental data for disaster prevention, mitigation and emergency rescue efforts in the impacted regions.

China has also helped developing countries train professionals. Through the Regional Center for Space Science and Technology Education in Asia and the Pacific (China) affiliated to the UN, it has trained some 2,000 space-industry professionals for more than 70 countries, and established the Belt and Road Aerospace Innovation Alliance and the Association of Sino-Russian Technical Universities. It has also promoted personnel exchanges in remote-sensing and navigation technology through an international training program, amongst other channels.