China’s dream of building a 21st-century Silk Road spanning half the planet was already ambitious. That was before outer space became part of the vision. Countries along Beijing’s flagship Silk Road Economic Belt and 21st-century Maritime Silk Road–better known as “One Belt, One Road”–will be among the first in line to plug into China’s new satellite-navigation services, according to a government policy paper on the country’s space program released Tuesday. That means people from East Africa to the South Pacific will have access to the Chinese Beidou-2 satellite network, Beijing’s answer to the U.S. Global Positioning System, by 2018, with the satellites providing the digital glue for the roads, railways, ports and industrial parks China intends to build on terra firma. The China-backed Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and the Silk Road Fund have around $140 billion in capital between them to finance infrastructure across two great arcs of Chinese trade: the land-based “belt” to the north stretching across Central Asia and Russia to Europe, and the maritime “road” to the south, encompassing East Africa, South Asia and Southeast Asia. The space policy paper, issued by the State Council Information Office, hints at how China plans to use its space technology to support its wide-ranging programs on the ground and further tie partner nations into the Beijing blueprint. Navigation and positioning services will form one element of a Belt and Road Initiative Space Information Corridor that China aims to set up over the next five years, the paper says. Earth observation, communications and other satellite services are also part of the package. The Beidou satellite network, which has 14 working satellites, will consist of 35 satellites by the end of the decade, the policy paper says. Beidou has applications across many areas being prioritized by the Silk Road plan, the policy paper says, including transportation systems, fisheries management and power distribution. The government foresees its Beidou satellites influencing all aspects of people’s lives and production in tandem with the infrastructure push. Beidou helped Chinese companies generate around $29 billion in revenue in 2015, just two years after its commercial launch, according to state media reports citing Miao Qianjun, secretary-general of the Global Navigation Satellite System and Location-based Services Association of China. As the system’s coverage area expands, neighboring countries including Thailand and Vietnam are using Beidou to deliver navigational data. China also seems to be banking on Beidou stimulating the economies that use the system, boosting trade along its new Silk Road and channeling benefits back to China. Though Beijing is spending an estimated $25 billion putting the satellites into orbit, the total market for satellite services in telecommunications and other sectors should be worth around $60 billion within the next few years, according to the system’s operator, the China Satellite Navigation Management Office. China is gearing up for the Beidou system to deliver global coverage in 2020, the policy paper adds. But countries that join China’s terrestrial One Belt, One Road will be first to share in its unearthly achievements, getting access to Beidou two years earlier.

• published: 29 Dec 2016
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