Jean-Jacques Dordain, our first of three speakers, spoke mainly of his experience at ESA and, in particular, as ESA’s former Director of Strategy. Good strategy to Jean-Jacques is all about combining forces: public and private, space and non-space and big and small enterprise. He also noted the importance of recognising that there is no space strategy without risk. Following on from Jean-Jacques’ European perspective, William ‘Mac’ Evans, former president of the Canadian Space Agency, explained Canada’s perspective using three major space strategy initiatives that the country has undertaken in the last 30 years. The underlying framework of these strategies is the notion that space is useful for other sectoral policies, namely, for science, satellite communications and earth observation. International cooperation and considerations with regards to Canadian supply chain were also key to the success of Canada’s space programme. Lastly, we heard from the UK’s former Minister of Science, Space and Technology, Ian Taylor, on his reflections concerning British space strategy. While Britain has come to understand that space is part of critical national infrastructure it is now more important than ever to recognise that Space is not a sector by itself but is integrated with the whole economy. Making decisions on priorities and allocation of resources is absolutely critical to strategy especially considering that only 10% of the space industry on which the UK depends is British owned.

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