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Government space agencies are established by governments of countries or regional groupings of countries to establish a means for advocating for and/or engaging in activities related to outer space, exploitation of space systems, and space exploration. The listings summarize all countries and regional authorities that have established space agencies. The listings established a comparative summary of demonstrated capabilities across the countries that have invested in the pursuit of space-based objectives.
Government space agency organizations are established with objectives that include national prestige, exploitation of remote sensing information, communications, education, and economic development. These agencies tend to be civil in nature (vs military) and serve to advance the benefits of exploitation and/or exploration of space. Government agencies span the spectrum from ancient organizations with small budgets to mature national or regional enterprises such as the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) of the United States, the European Space Agency (ESA) which coordinates for more than 20 constituent countries, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), the Roscosmos State Corporation for Space Activities (Roscosmos) of Russia, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), and the China National Space Agency (CNSA).
The space agency listings are segregated to enable identification of subsets of the complete list that have advanced to higher levels or technical or programmatic proficiency in accordance with the following:
- Establishment of agency, initial exploitation of space-based systems
- Development of launch capability
- Capacity for extraterrestrial exploration
- Demonstration of human spaceflight capability across one or more of these domains
The four listings identify a technological progression in complexity and capacity that historically aligned to the developments that occurred during the 20th century space race between the United States and the Soviet Union. It is not intended to offer that this is the only path to advanced space faring status; variations and adaptations are expected and are likely to occur based on the technological capabilities that are available to today as opposed to 50 or more years ago. For each identified "Demonstrated capability" a reference is included to that program's first demonstration of the technical capacity or capability to meet the defined objective.
The fifth listing identifies countries that are considering or are developing space agency organizations but have not ratified formation or operation as of yet.
Note as well that the demonstrated capabilities represent the national (or regional) capacity to achieve the identified objective. These listings do not attempt to determine which programs were uniquely or solely funded by the space agency itself. For each listing, the short name or acronym identified is the English version, with the native language version below. The date of the founding of the space agency is the date of first operations where applicable. If the space agency is no longer running, then the date when it was terminated. Additionally, the strategic nature of many space programs result in cooperation between civil agency and military organizations to meet unique staff and technical proficiencies required to support space programs given the geographic expanse required to ensure successful operation.[citation needed]
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As of 2024,[update] nearly 80 different government space agencies are in existence, including more than 70 national space agencies and several international agencies. Initial competencies demonstrated include the funding and nomination of candidates to serve as astronauts, cosmonauts, or taikonauts with the countries/organizations executing human spaceflight solutions. Other demonstrated capabilities include the operation of a satellite (e.g. a communications or remote sensing system) largely developed and/or delivered by a third party, the domestic development of a satellite system, and the capacity to recover a science payload from a sub-orbital or orbital mission. Several space agencies, both national and international, have demonstrated all four of those capabilities.[citation needed]
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This group of agencies have developed or are developing launch infrastructure including space launch sites, suborbital launch technology, orbital launch systems, and reusable hardware technologies.
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This group of agencies have developed advanced technological capabilities required for travel and study of other heavenly bodies within the Solar System. These involve the capacity to leave the local area around the planet Earth for lunar and/or missions to other bodies in the Solar System. As of February 2023, six (6) countries/agencies have achieved objectives necessary to be listed here.
Without launch capabilities
This category is formed by agencies that operate and construct satellites in extraterrestrial environments, but do not have the capability to transport those satellites to the desired orbit/trajectory/landing spot. As far as we know as of the 10th May 2024, five space agencies have achieved the requirements to be listed here:
| Country | Space agency | Demonstrated capability | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Name | Acronym | Founded | Operates extraterrestrial orbiter | Controlled surface impact | Uncrewed soft landing | Uncrewed rover operation | Sample return | |
 Luxembourg |
LuxSpace | No acronym | Nov 2004 |  (Manfred Memorial Moon Mission, flyby only) |  | | | |
 Italy |
Italian Space Agency | ITA/ASI | 1 Jan 1988 | (ArgoMoon) | | | | |
 South Korea |
Korea Aerospace Research Institute | KARI | 10 Oct 1989 | (Danuri) | | | | |
 UAE |
United Arab Emirates Space Agency | UAESA | Aug 2014 [clarification needed] | (Emirates Mars Mission) | | | | |
 Pakistan |
Space & Upper Atmosphere Research Commission | SUPARCO | 1961 [clarification needed] | (ICUBE-Q) | | | | |
- Failed projects like "Colmena" of the MSA/AEM (Mexican Space Agency/Agencia Espacial Mejicana) are not included in this list.
- ISA (Israel Space Agency) does have launch vehicles (Shavit 2) but not powerful enough to reach further than Earth orbit.
- This list doesn't include the previous space agencies.
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This small group of countries/space agencies have demonstrated the highest technological capacity with systems and solutions that support human spaceflight along with the ancillary technological capabilities to support human activity in orbit and/or on extraterrestrial bodies. The missions identified (and personnel when appropriate) are the first successful accomplishments of each activity.
| Country | Space agency | Demonstrated capability | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Name | Acronym | Founded | Crewed space launch | EVA | Rendezvous and docking | Space station | Crewed circumlunar flight | Crewed Moon landing | |
 China |
China National Space Administration | CNSA | 22 Apr 1993 | (Shenzhou 5) | (Shenzhou 7) | (Shenzhou 8 to Tiangong-1) | (Tiangong-1) | | |
 Russia |
Roscosmos State Corporation for Space Activities | Roscosmos Роскосмос |
25 Feb 1992 | (Soyuz TM-14) | (Mir, Aleksandr Volkov and Sergei Krikalev) | (Soyuz TM-14 to ISS) | (Mir) | | |
 Soviet Union |
Soviet space program | СССР Космическая программа |
1955 disbanded 25 Dec 1991 | (Vostok 1) | (Voskhod 2, Alexei Leonov) | (Soyuz 4 to Soyuz 5) | (Salyut 1) | | |
 United States |
National Aeronautics and Space Administration[102] | NASA | 29 Jul 1958 | (Mercury-Redstone 3) | (Gemini 4, Ed White) | (Gemini 8 to GATV) | (Skylab) | (Apollo 8) | (Apollo 11) |
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| Country/Countries | Space agency | Expected date of formation | Current status | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Name | Acronym | |||
 Albania |
Albanian Space Office | ASO | — | Proposed in 2020, at progress stage.[122] |
 Armenia |
Armenian Space Agency | ArmCosmos | — | Proposed in 2013 with the goal to launch satellites. Negotiating with the International Telecommunication Union to clear the path for its prospective launch.[123] |
 Bhutan |
Bhutan Space Office | BSO | — | Proposed in 2016, at progress stage.[124] |
 Botswana |
Botswana Aeronautics and Space Agency | BotswanaSpace | — | Proposed in 2020, at progress stage.[125] |
 Cambodia |
Cambodian Aeronautics and Space Office | CASO | — | Proposed in 2016, at progress stage.[126] |
 Croatia |
Croatian Space Agency | CROSA | — | Proposed in 2020, currently operate as NGO Adriatic Aerospace Association (A3), at progress stage.[127][128] |
 Djibouti |
Djibouti National Space Office | — | — | Announced in 2022, at bill stage.[129] |
 Guatemala |
Guatemala Space Agency | — | — | Proposed in 2019, at progress stage.[130][131] |
 Honduras |
Honduras Space Agency | AEH | — | Proposed in 2018, at progress stage.[132] |
 Iraq |
TBD | TBD | — | Proposed in 2019, at progress stage.[133] |
 Laos |
Lao Aeronautics and Space Agency | LaoSpace | — | Proposed in 2015, at progress stage.[134] |
 Latvia |
Latvia Space Office | LSO | — | Proposed in 2020, at progress stage.[135] |
 Malta |
Malta Space Office | MSO | — | Proposed in 2022, at progress stage.[136] |
 Moldova |
Moldova National Space Office | — | — | Proposed in 2018, at progress stage.[137] |
 Monaco |
Monaco Space Agency | — | — | Proposed in 2020, at progress stage.[138] |
 Montenegro |
Montenegrin National Bureau of Space | — | — | Announced in 2022, bill stage.[139] |
 Myanmar |
Myanmar Aeronautics and Space Agency | MyanmarSpace | — | Proposed in 2019, at progress stage.[140][141] |
 Nepal |
Nepal Aeronautics and Space Office | NepalSpace | — | Proposed in 2018, at progress stage.[142] |
 Nicaragua |
Nicaraguan Space Agency | AEN | — | Announced in 2021, bill stage.[143][144] |
 Oman |
Oman Space Agency | OSA | — | Proposed in 2020, at progress stage.[145][146] |
 Panama |
Panama Space Agency | AEP | — | Proposed in 2014, at progress stage.[147] |
 Serbia |
Serbian Space Office | SerbSpace | — | Proposed in 2016, at progress stage.[148] |
 Slovenia |
Slovenian National Bureau of Space | — | — | Proposed in 2019, at progress stage.[149][150] |
 Sri Lanka |
Sri Lanka Aeronautics and Space Agency | SLASA | — | Proposed in 2009. Immediate goal was to construct and launch two satellites. Sri Lankan Telecommunications Regulatory Commission had signed an agreement with Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd to get the relevant help and resources.[151] |
 Sudan |
Sudan Space Agency | — | — | Proposed in 2017, at progress stage.[152] |
 Tanzania |
Tanzanian National Space Agency | TNSA | — | Proposed in 2021, at progress stage.[153] |
 Uruguay |
Uruguayan Space Agency | AEU | 2022 | Announced in 2021, bill stage.[154] |
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The annual budgets listed are the official budgets of national space agencies available in public domain. The budgets are not normalized to the expenses of space research in different countries, i.e. higher budget does not necessarily mean more activity or better performance in space exploration.[155][156] Budget could be used for different projects: e.g. GPS is maintained from the US defence budget,[157] whereas ESA's money is used for developing the European Galileo positioning system.[158] For European contributors to ESA, the national budgets shown include also their contributions to ESA.
Eight government space agencies, the United States (NASA), China (CNSA), France (CNES), Germany (DLR), India (ISRO), Italy (ASI), Japan (JAXA) and Russia (Roscosmos), have annual budgets of more than one billion US dollars.
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