Russian experts believe it is necessary to expand space co-operation with South Africa

During the meeting of the Presidium of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS), the main topic was Russia's co-operation with African countries in the field of science, technology and education, taking into account Russia's development strategy.

According to corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences Alexander Lutovinov, the main areas of cooperation between the two countries include, in particular, fundamental research within the framework of joint projects with the Russian Science Foundation and the Ministry of Education and Science.

He noted that the main areas of cooperation between the two countries include fundamental research within the framework of joint projects with the Russian Science Foundation and the Russian Ministry of Education and Science, support for the flagship project BRICS-OTN, designed to search for new objects and monitor potentially dangerous objects and space debris, as well as working out the issue of using the territory and resources of South Africa to receive scientific data from Russian space observatories.

"The key thing that the Russian Academy of Sciences may be interested in is communication with spacecraft. South Africa has a unique geographical location as well as comfortable weather conditions. This is a great opportunity to deploy ground-based space communication points that can complement Russian ground-based receiving and tracking stations," emphasised Alexander Lutovinov.