SPACE+SPATIAL

Introduction

There is a great deal of activity currently underway that will undoubtedly contribute to the growth of the space and spatial industries. However, this activity is fragmented and, by world standards, falls well short of positioning Australia as a fully-fledged space-faring nation. Rapid growth is essential.

This paper is intended to seek to identify the new and additional actions and investments that can build on this activity through comprehensive consultation with key stakeholders, including stakeholders within the space and industries and those who are users, beneficiaries or contributors to the space and spatial industries. The outcomes of this consultation will ‘stand on the shoulders’ of the work already announced and underway and will help form
a key part of the 2030 RoadMap itself. Actions that will be included in the RoadMap will be those that have a champion together with identified sources of resourcing.

This paper sets out an initial set of issues assembled by the Steering Committee for the 2030 Space and Spatial Growth RoadMap . Australia’s space science community, although small, has well recognised world class expertise in certain areas from which we can build. By contrast Australia’s spatial community reputation and track record is much more dominant by world standards and operating in tandem with the space community can serve as strong basis on which both can grow.

These issues set out in this paper are not exhaustive, and it is expected that consultation will lead to the identification of new issues and actions and changes to those already included herein.

Two additional pieces of companion work are already underway. The first is the development of a ‘Space and Spatial Ecosystem Map’. Currently a work-in-progress, this map sets out the major elements of the system that the 2030 Steering Committee considers will comprise the optimal ecosystem by 2030. It forms a view about elements that need to be established or further developed, which ones should have a strong Australian base and which ones can be sourced by overseas providers. The 2030 Steering Committee is oversighting the development
of this map.

The second piece of work is an analysis of the risks faced by all areas of Australia’s society, economy and critical infrastructure through their reliance and dependence on space assets and systems, including satellite telecommunications, PNT from GNSS, and earth observation by satellite. This work will include consideration of the vital role played by spatial information and spatial infrastructure. This work is taking a supply chain view of these risks and dependencies using a formal approach based on ISO 31000:2018 Risk Management Standard. It is being conducted under the auspices of the Department of Home Affairs with the secretariat provided by the Australian Space Agency. The outcomes of this work will be made available to the 2030 Steering Committee for inclusion, where relevant, in the 2030 RoadMap.