Korea lags far behind other economies such as the U.S., Russia and Japan in space technology investment.

The country is also behind China and India, which have made significant investments in the development of their lunar probe programs.

The country hopes to conduct its first successful space rocket launch this week after two failed attempts in August 2009 and June 2010. The Korea Space Launch Vehicle-1, also known as Naro-1, is the country’s first locally assembled space rocket.

Its first-stage thruster was made by Russia’s Khrunichev State Research and Production Space Center and the rest was built by the Korea Aerospace Research institute.

By Park Hyong-ki (hkp@heraldcorp.com)