Space Tourism

The commercial space market is in existence since 1970. At present, the world mar­ket for satellite-based services—including telecommunications, television, global positioning systems and Earth observation (weather, environmental, search and rescue)—is valued at nearly US$90 billion. The problem with the commercial space market is that it has not been large enough to attract private investment in the technologies needed to lower the cost of access to space. Space tourism holds great promise as an economic ‘driver’, leading to market competition to lower launch costs and space travel and stay costs which could in turn attract other customers to the space market.[337]

All these years, sending a human to the space has remained a costly affair, and it costs around US$ 25-30 million per trip. Countries in the region have depended on the USA and Russia to send their astronauts to the space. In the recent past,

Malaysia and South Korea had sent their astronauts via this mechanism. India also has inked deal with Russia in this regard, and as a commercial activity, two Indian space travellers would be flying the non-reusable ‘Soyuz TMA’ ship to be piloted by a Russian cosmonaut.[338] However, all these efforts should be viewed form a point of view of using space travel as a tool to enhance country’s international image, popularise space science and generate feeling of nationalism amongst its population. Couple of years ago, China succeeded in sending men to the space using its own spacecraft.

However, coming years may witness a significant change in attitude towards space travel in form of a shift from state sponsored to private activity. Burt Rutan’s SpaceShipOne, the winner of the Ansari X-Prize, is helping open a new frontier of economic development. In cooperation with Richard Branson and other entrepreneurs, a new space market is likely to emerge. Few Japanese companies and individuals are keen to invest in this industry and have already made business plans to that effect.[339] Various new ideas are being discussed, and even businessmen from states like Singapore are working towards possessing next-generation space vehicles which could offer a 5-min trip to fly 100 km above Earth surface. Space Tourism Society in Malaysia feels that building space tourism vehicle would be more expensive, and Third World countries should enter this business as administrative supporters in the space tourism activities and organisations. They may also invest in programmes like training astronauts and so on [15]. Abu Dhabi is also likely to emerge as a major commercial centre and could materialise as a hub for commercial space activities.

Asia may not take a lead in space tourism in the next couple of decades, but a few private entities from Asia may join the global bandwagon. The major uncertainty in this field could be the approach of governments. Different governments would try to regulate the industry based on their perceptions about passenger safety standards offered by private companies and the overall impact of having private spacecrafts on national security.