Hanoi: Vietnam blasted into the satellite age today when a rocket launch from South America propelled its first orbiter into space, allowing it to beam home telecoms data and television signals.

From a command centre set amid lush rice fields outside the capital Hanoi, scientists tracked the Arianespace rocket as it propelled the Vinasat-1 on its path to hover 36,000 kilometres above the equator.

"This project is politically, economically and socially important," said Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung, soon after the launch, noting that it would help to "raise Vietnam s image on the international stage."

The blast-off may only have been a small step for the European space agency in French Guiana, but it represents one great leap for communist Vietnam, a developing country with patchy phone coverage that only introduced the Internet a decade ago.

War-shattered and largely isolated until the early 1990s, Vietnam has seen a decade of rapid economic growth and is now racing to build the infrastructure to match the rising expectations of investors and its 86 million people.

The satellite project, worth around $300 million, "puts Vietnam on the map of the world for using satellite communications," said a visibly proud Deputy Information and Communications Minister Tran Duc Lai.

"Demand for communications is now booming. Ten years ago we had only fixed telephones. Then we introduced mobiles. Since 1997 we started to introduce the Internet," he said.

"Now there is very high demand. We have around 23 per cent of people who can access the Internet. By 2010 the target is to reach 40 per cent."
Source : PTI