International cooperation pivotal to space technology advancement, says Hazza Al Mansoori, UAE astronaut and the first Emirati to go to space

International cooperation will remain crucial in the pursuit of greater innovations and to mitigate challenges in the space sector, Hazza Al Mansoori, UAE Astronaut and the first Emirati to go to space, said.

Speaking directly from Houston, Al Mansoori addressed delegates at the second edition of Future Innovation Summit.

Al Mansoori highlighted how the UAE’s Emirates Mars Mission – led by the Hope project – recently landed a spacecraft on Mars, and added that this marks a big step for the UAE’s vision to catalyse space-derived innovations and accelerate overall social and economic development.

The Future Innovation Summit also included a Boston Consulting Group (BCG)-led panel discussion on the “Vision of the UAE Space Industry” with Adnan Al Rais, the senior director of the Remote Sensing Department at the Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Centre (MBRSC), and Adnan Al Noornai, founder of Future Innovation Summit, which was moderated by Thibault Werle, the managing director and partner of BCG.

The panellists expressed how space exploration is driving the creation of futuristic technologies, which have a potentially vast range of applications on earth if they are effectively harnessed by business and innovators.

For instance, more than 2,000 technology spin-offs have come out of NASA programme.

Additionally, the number of national space agencies has nearly doubled in the past 20 years with more than 70 countries currently engaged in space activities.

In this context, Eng Adnan Al Raisi underpinned the need for the UAE to build a strong local space ecosystem in the UAE.

He reiterated the need to ensure that technological innovations that stem from space programmes are shared to advance inclusive and sustainable progress at a global level.

As the focus on space technologies continues to grow, more than 15,000 additional satellites are likely to orbit the planet by 2030, Al Raisi said, while also warning of dangerous space debris that could pose a threat to human spaceflight and exploration missions.