The potential of Mexico and the new Latin American Space Agency
Airbus, a French company, highlighted the "potential" of the Latin American and Caribbean Space Agency (ALCE), promoted by Mexico and signed by 18 countries to insert the region in space development.
The French company Airbus highlighted the "potential" of the Latin American and Caribbean Space Agency (ALCE), promoted by Mexico and signed by 18 countries to insert the region in space development. ALCE will be based in Mexico with the confirmed participation of Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Bolivia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominica, Ecuador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, St. Lucia, and Venezuela.
The international organization will coordinate cooperation in space exploration, research, and technology to enhance the regional capacity of Earth observation systems for agriculture, disasters, security, meteorology, resource exploration, and intelligence. Airbus is one of the main participants in Famex, an event that brings together the twelfth largest aerospace industry in the world, and which took off at the new Felipe Angeles International Airport (AIFA).
The Mexican aeronautical sector has grown an average of 14% annually in the last decade, reaching exports worth US$9.7 billion in 2019, according to the Mexican Federation of the Aerospace Industry (Femia). The Ministry of Economy (SE) has projected that, by 2025, this industry will rank as the tenth most important in the world with more than 400 companies in the country, 110,000 jobs, and $12 billion in exports, according to Femia.
For now, Airbus has in Mexico more than 500 direct employees in its three divisions, and generates more than 4,000 indirect jobs and more than 400 million dollars a year in acquisitions to its supply chain, particularly in Querétaro, a state in the center of the country. Furthermore, Mexico is home to the largest Airbus Defence and Space fleet in the region, with 22 C295 aircraft in operation.
Mexico and Argentina lay the foundation for the Latin American Space Agency
Mexico and Argentina signed a declaration on the constitution of a Latin American and Caribbean Space Agency, informed the Mexican Ministry of Foreign Affairs (SRE). The agreement, signed by Foreign Ministers Marcelo Ebrard, of Mexico, and Felipe Carlos Solá, of Argentina, was announced within the framework of the United Nations World Space Week.
The Declaration on the Constitution of a Regional Mechanism for Cooperation in the Field of Space represents the first step towards the establishment of a Latin American and Caribbean Space Agency. This declaration is the result of the agreements reached at the Latin American and Caribbean Meeting on Space, held on July 2, 2020, and is part of Mexico's 2020 Work Plan, during its pro tempore presidency of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC).
Mexico believes that the exchange of knowledge and the generation of capacities in the field of science and technology "is fundamental for economic and social development" in addition to strengthening the integration and autonomy of the region, said Ebrard.
The Argentine Foreign Minister underlined "the role of space as a factor of development" and said that Argentina is promoting the creation of a regional mechanism in this area as long as it allows better use of resources to face projects from and for the region. The Minister of Communications and Transport of Mexico, Jorge Arganis, celebrated the signing of this declaration and described it as a historic event.
Argentina has four satellites in orbit, two geostationary and two Earth observation satellites for the generation of images, and at present, a satellite launcher or injector and an oceanic satellite are under development. The countries expressed their commitment to invite the nations of Latin America and the Caribbean to adhere to this Declaration in order to strengthen the objective of establishing the space agency.
