ALMATY. June 7 (Interfax-AVN) - Kazakhstan's Kazkosmos national space company is going to announce the tender one of these days on the development and production of an Earth remote sensing satellite, the company's Chief Executive Officer Serik Turzhanov said.
"We are going to give the green light to the tender one of these days. It will be organized in two or three stages, so that we could monitor the whole technological process. The tender will envisage both the development and production," Turzhanov told a news conference in Almaty on Wednesday.
He noted that several foreign companies, including three Russian ones, are going to take part.
"The monitoring of our territory is one of the conceptual missions," he said, adding that a group of earth remote sensing satellites would be of paramount importance in this light.
"This project will help Kazakhstan monitor many objects on its territory, which will cut down the expenses for their support," Turzhanov said.
He added that Kazakhstan is going to become the world's 13th country that has such satellites in orbit.
He also said that Kazakhstan has entered the negotiations on integration of its group of satellites into the international earth remote sensing group.
According to earlier reports, Turzhanov voiced his country's decision to develop several satellites by 2012 in late 2005. Under the plans, four communication satellites, four Earth remote sensing ones, and several global positioning ones will be deployed.