Abuja — Federal government has expressed the determination to tap into over $200 billion revenue accruable from the sales of satellite imagery worldwide, when the national Space Research and Development Agency (NASRDA) signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the DMC International Imaging Limited (DMCII), UK as the exclusive distributor for the sale of NigerSat-2 and NigeriaSat-X.

Director General of the NARSDA, Seidu Mohammed, who signed the agreement on behalf of the federal government, said the exercise was to better prepare the agency for the exploitation of imageries from the two satellites to be launched in the 3rd quarters of the year for international market.

While noting that the signing of the agreement will assist DMCII in canvassing for international customers and sign necessary sales contracts prior to the launch of the satellites, he said, "It is our strong belief that the signing of international imagery sales agreement with experienced marketers such as the DMCII UK will enable Nigeria recoup some money expended in building these satellites."

Seidu stressed that this will equally go a long way in promoting Nigeria in the global community as its satellite imageries become international products for strategic and sustainable development planning across the globe."

According to Mohammed, NigeriaSat2 was manufactured by Surrey Satellite Technology Limited (SSTL) UK with the participation of Nigerian engineers, while NigeriaSat-X (a training model of NigeriaSat-2 built to flight standard) is constructed by Nigerian engineers using the facilities of Surrey Satellite Technology Limited in UK .

The two Satellites, he noted would be deployed together using the same launch vehicle in Russia with NigeriaSat-X being placed into by approximately five minutes after NigeriaSat-2.

He further stated that NigeriaSat2 sensor will provide imagery at three resolutions, which include 2.5m panchromatic, 5m multispectorla (R,G,B,NIR) and also carries the 32m multi-spectral payload of NigeriaSat-1 and more importantly NigeriSat-2 can image in stereo mode, while the NigeriaSatX sensor will provide 22m multi-spectral (RGB, NIR) imagery.

He said, "For Nigeria, the intended usage of imageries from NigeriaSat-2 and NigeriaSat-X is for broad area coverage inclusive of land use, geospatial analysis and environmental change monitoring. It will also be used for mapping, accurate geolocation and resale.

Nigeriasat-2 is expected to provide a maximum of 250 images per day, while imagery volume from NigeriaSat-X has been estimated to be a handful of images per day, sharing many of the same storage and processing capabilities from the NigeriaSat 2 system.