The government announced this morning that the federal budget will be tabled on March 22nd. At that time it is expected that the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) will receive an increase in it’s budget by 8.7%, this according to the National Post.
It is unclear at this time what specific programs within the CSA will see a budget increase however yesterday at the University of Toronto Space Program conference CSA President Steve MacLean did give a hint. He outlined the reorganized divisions within the CSA noting that 36% of the CSA’s budget is spent on Space Utilization, which is primarily space based earth observation, and that he wanted to increase this to 51%. This is most likely where the additional funding will go. The other divisions include Space Exploration, which receives 28% of the budget and Space Science and Technology which receives 15% of the budget.
This has being plaguing CSA for the last 5 years. They have managed to convince the government to increase their budget and may start planning this increase in their future activities. However, the current political landscape seems to be indicating that the budget will not be approved and they will have to wait and try to convince again the government for this budget increase.