On the occasion of the visit to Jakarta of Jean-Marc Ayrault, France’s Minister for Foreign Affairs and International Development, and in the presence of Retno Marsudi, Indonesia’s Minister for Foreign Affairs, CNES President Jean-Yves Le Gall and Thomas Djamaluddin, Chairman of LAPAN, the Indonesian National Institute of Aeronautics and Space, signed a five-year framework agreement on 28th February covering space cooperation between the two nations.

LAPAN is the Indonesian government agency with responsibility for promoting research and the development of science, technologies and applications in the fields of aeronautics and space.

Two weeks after the launch of Indonesia’s Telkom-3S satellite by Ariane 5 from the Guiana Space Centre, CNES and LAPAN are thus set to step up their cooperation by facilitating sharing of experience, organizing training and hosting Indonesian engineers in order to develop joint research projects. The framework agreement will also enable new ties with universities, research centres and the space industry in France.

After the signature of the agreement, Jean-Yves Le Gall held meetings at the Ministry for Research, Technology and Higher Education and the Ministry for Maritime Affairs and Fisheries. He underlined the advantages offered by CLS, CNES’s subsidiary and the world leader in location and data collection systems, which is coordinating Indonesia’s key INDESO scientific and operational oceanography project.