Sun Zhihui, director of the State Oceanic Administration, made the remarks after the successful launching of self-developed "Haiyang-1B" oceanic satellite from the Taiyuan Satellite Launching Center on Wednesday.

China plans to have a system consisting of ocean color remote sensing satellites, ocean dynamic environment satellites and ocean surveillance satellites.

Haiyang-1B is an ocean color remote sensing satellite. China will launch the Haiyang-2 satellite, or ocean dynamic environment satellites, in 2009 and is currently analyzing customer demand for the Haiyang-3 satellite, or ocean surveillance satellite, Sun said.

Satellite ocean remote sensing technology plays a critical role in oceanic research, maritime environment and disaster relief and other academic research.

There are more than 30 oceanic satellites in orbit around the planet.

Sun said oceanic satellites are urgently needed in China to develop the country's marine economy, providing marine disaster early warning and safeguarding the nation's legitimate marine rights.

"Although China is one of only five countries in the world able to independently launch ocean color remote sensing satellites, we still lag behind developed countries in this field," said Sun.

He said China hoped to be able to close the research gap with developed countries in satellite launching and observation technologies and control and ground application technologies by 2015.

The State Oceanic Administration plans to establish oceanic satellite ground stations in Mudanjiang City, in northeast China's Heilongjiang Province, and in Beijing, to enlarge the Sanya oceanic satellite ground station and to build national satellite data receiving stations in the Antarctica and the Arctic.

Source: Xinhua News Agency

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