Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi hailed the centre as a boost for national prestige and said it would spur the economy with space-related activities.

"The Malaysia Space Centre is a strategic and important infrastructure which will benefit space technology and further develop the country," Abdullah said in a speech.

"This is an additional step taken to propel the country to a future that is more advanced and to move forward by acquiring more knowledge and technology," he said.

Located just outside the capital Kuala Lumpur, the space centre is a sprawling 400-acre (162-hectare) complex surrounded by palm-oil plantations.

The site, selected for its flat geography and minimal radio interference, houses two communications antennas operating the RAZAKSAT satellite which provides images for environmental assessment and monitoring.

"In the last few decades satellite images have been widely used for various reasons such as monitoring and predicting the weather, landscapes and more importantly to monitor natural disasters such as forest fires and haze as well as oil spills," Abdullah said.

Malaysia's first astronaut and a back-up candidate, chosen from thousands of hopefuls in a nationwide contest, will soon begin training at Moscow's Star City before heading into space on a Russian Soyuz spacecraft.

The project was conceived in 2003 when Russia agreed to send a Malaysian to the International Space Station as part of a billion-dollar purchase of 18 Sukhoi 30-MKM fighter jets.

The new space centre has a "mission control facility" which will be used to communicate with the Malaysian astronaut when he is in space.

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