The Latin American Space Agency

It’s the year 2048.

Humanity has invented a spaceship that can travel at the speed of light.

Going from galaxy to galaxy.

All the while blasting Colombian vallenato with an Oaxacan cook on board always making tacos de pastor and plenty of Brazilian Caipirinhas to enjoy.

Maybe a Guatemalan Quetzal on board to keep the passengers happy as a pet?

Some Peruvian providing plenty of ayahuasca to help folks have a good trip while flying through space…

And some strange Chilean whose Spanish nobody can understand but always goes on repeat “Cachai? Cachai?!?”

Welcome to the Latin American Space Agency.

The Latin American Space Agency

For those who don’t know, Latin America has taken a decent step forward to having its own “Space Agency” as you can read here in Spanish.

Of course, Latin America has always had at least some involvement with space related topics in some countries.

For example, Chile is well known for being a great place for important telescopes to analyze space as you can see here.

Also, as you can see here, Costa Rica developed a plasma engine for rockets.

Or how the Brazilians also have focused on their own space program despite setbacks like you can see here. 

So the news that various countries in Latin America have taken the step to creating a “Latin American Space Agency” is pretty cool and in line with previous efforts to expand Latin America’s role in analyzing space.

Which countries will be involved?

Well, according to the article here, the following Latin American countries have already signed off on their involvement with it: Mexico, Argentina, Ecuador, Bolivia, Paraguay and Costa Rica.

When I first saw that list, my first impression was that a few of the countries seemed random.

Bolivia and Paraguay specifically.

Being some of the poorest countries of Latin America, I’m not sure how much money they can invest into the program.

Granted, as you can read here, Bolivia does have plenty of raw materials like lithium.

Not sure if resources like that are needed for a space program though but maybe!

I have no idea anyhow.

And Paraguay could, in theory, maybe send an astronaut to teach Guarani to space aliens.

Why the hell not?

Still, some of the countries like Mexico or Argentina make more sense given the extra amount of money they have.

Though, with AMLO as Mexico’s President, I’m not entirely convinced that the dude will kick a whole lot of money to the program.

Given this is the same guy who demonizes the middle class as you can read here and seems to have a stick up his ass against science as you can read here…

Well, I’m not convinced he’ll be that helpful for the program until he’s out of office.

But we’ll see. He still has a few years left in office.

Also, we have Ecuador that could be used to launch shit into space given their location on the equator.

Of course, there’s some countries missing from this list that surprises me.

Particularly Colombia, Peru, Chile and Brazil.

Countries that are relatively richer with more money to kick into this joint initiative.

And, as I said before, Chile and Brazil already have expressed interest and have relative importance to exploring space.

But, as the article says, other Latin countries are encouraged to join and, in all likelihood, more will as time goes on.

All around, an interesting development in Latin America!

There are a few more other things to mention though when it comes to this initiative.

South America?

Though the article was written in Spanish, I found the title of the article to be funny:

“Varios países de Sudamérica acuerdan poner en marcha la Agencia Espacial Latinoamericana.”

Then it lists off Mexico and Costa Rica as being part of the team.

Not South America at all!

Though, to be fair, they could’ve said “Iberian America.”

That would’ve been nice – you know, low key reference my website, right?

Then ideally a link to my blog.

Anyhow, despite the article being in Spanish, it was funny to see that error in the title itself.

Rockets or Spaceships?

Of course, we should be realistic.

It isn’t likely that Latin America as a whole will be sending spaceships into the world to visit Mars or whatever else.

Though, in the coming centuries, I’m optimistic enough to think the job will be done in which this space program advances to some real shit.

And so I see it as being more focused on things like rockets, satellites, etc.

I definitely think though that, in the long run, Latin America will make more efforts to expand its interest in space in whatever way it is capable of doing so collectively.

Especially as, to which you can read here, there is a lot of value in expanding into space for various reasons.

One of them being the immense amount of resources that could be collected from things like asteroids to all the other benefits from being involved in space.

As we saw with Trump and his “Space Agency” as you can read here, the US recognizes also the national security importance to being in space.

And I think other countries will follow suit for that reason and others – in whatever form they can.

It would be interesting to see though if someday Latin America has its own “Elon Musk” in which the private sector takes up a bit of the work in Latin America.

I might be a bit too optimistic on all of this though but, in the long run and at its own pace, I see Latin America advancing similarly.

Still, it’s not entirely positive either in my opinion

Corruption?

Given the impressive capability of the elites in Latin America to steal funds intended for other purposes, I’m positive that not all of the funds will necessarily be used efficiently or spent how they were intended.

As you can see here, even the use of the donations for earthquake victims from the September 19, 2017 earthquake was not very transparent.  

If we are going to potentially fuck with funds for earthquake victims, then I don’t see how the “space agency” is off limits.

It is what it is.

Move Beyond Resources?

As you can read here, expanding into space can bring financial benefits to various industries.

Lots of economic potential!

Though I don’t believe this will make any Latin country into a superstar on the world stage anytime soon, I do see how this can help diversify some of the economies down here.

I mentioned this already the economic benefits but I wanted to make this a separate point as to, from my limited understanding, the possibility of this helping diversify the economy of some Latin countries away from just selling natural resources.

For example, as you can read here, Argentina is already well positioned to making respectable satellites.

And other countries, like Mexico or Brazil, do produce or manufacture some technological goods as you can see in this example here.

By diversifying the economy a little bit more away from an over reliance on raw materials, then that does bring stronger stability and more prosperity to some countries down here that.

And given that this is a joint effort among various Latin countries from the poorest (Paraguay or Bolivia) to the richer ones, then I could only hope that it will help the economies of even poorer countries also to whatever degree it can.

Again, not saying any of this will make any Latin country an economic superstar.

As it is just as likely that the space program goes nowhere, a percentage of funds get eaten by corruption, economic crisis in countries like Argentina might dwindle the funds to the program and whatever else.

But it’s an observation that, if things go well with this, then economic benefits can hopefully be seen.

Fingers crossed.

But speaking of the economic implications of this a little bit more….

Good Use of Funds?

Understandably, some might criticize this idea.

Why should Latin countries be investing into this when so many people live in poverty?

For example, as you can read here, apparently almost half of Mexicans have gone into poverty over the last year.

Of course, every Latin country is different and poverty and rates of socioeconomic inequality vary by country.

Still, it’s a criticism that I feel does at least deserve recognition given the idea that funds for the space program could instead be used on poverty reduction programs or whatever else to help the common person.

I get the idea.

Regardless, I do see some economic benefits from this as I said before.

And it’s not like, or at least I imagine it to not be the case, that a significant percentage of federal funds in each involved Latin country will be spent on this.

Nothing like 10% of the federal budget or whatever.

So I don’t see as much harm in contributing to this – especially if some of the economic benefits pan out.

Vallenato in Space?

Finally, let it be known that the US once sent a space craft into the US containing information of cultural value to humanity into space.

So that, if the day comes, some alien civilization will find it and know something about it.

Regardless of if our species is still around by then.

More on that in this video here.

So it’s crossed my mind – what could Latin America send into space?

Well, hopefully some music at the very least, right?

Now, if we were to go the music route, I’d imagine that some Latinos might send what they think is their best music.

Shit like vallenato or banda.

I think bigger.

Why not reggaeton viejo?

The shit that everyone loves!

That finds more popularity in non-Latin countries!

So here’s a playlist of some songs I recommend we introduce to the space aliens.

If, by any chance they find it, it would hopefully seduce the female segment of the alien civilization as they enjoy our seductive reggaeton music.

In theory, that’ll lead to them searching for our civilization…

And then, to every man’s secret fetish often searched on Pornhub, we could finally have some human-alien orgies.

Plenty of memorable moments.

Caipirinhas included.

Not aguardiente.

Anyhow, that’s all I got to say.

Enjoy this video here on space interest from Latin America.

Drop any comments below.

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Thanks for reading.

Best regards,

Matt