Chang'e 4 Awarded Mission Prize by MVA

China's Chang'e 4 lunar probe project won the Moon Village Principles – Mission Prize 2019 at the 3rd International Moon Village Workshop & Symposium on Dec 5.

Giuseppe Reibaldi, President of the Moon Village Association (MVA), stated that "Moon Exploration and Utilization must be carried out for all humankind, considering the benefits that this will bring."

Wu Weiren, chief designer of China's lunar exploration project, attended the MVA symposium and delivered a keynote speech, expressing appreciation to the association and the award committee on behalf of the Chang'e-4 mission team.

He said that China is willing to work together with other countries to explore and use outer space and will continue to support MVA's activities.

Wider international cooperation will be carried out in further missions like Chang'e-5, 6 and 7 for more scientific achievement and experience.

Founded in 2017, the MVA is a non-governmental organization based in Vienna and is intended to create a permanent global informal forum for stakeholders like governments, industry, academia and the general public interested in moon exploration projects.

According to the association, the Mission Prize will be issued every year after 2019. Two other winners of the award were the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), by NASA of the United States and India's Chandrayaan-2 of ISRO.

The Chang'e-4 probe made the first-ever soft landing on the Von Karman Crater in the South Pole-Aitken Basin on the far side of the moon on Jan 3, 2019. Later, the probe and its rover Yutu-2 (or Jade Rabbit-2) began detection and inspection tours.

The mission was also awarded the Team Gold Medal of the United Kingdom's Royal Aeronautical Society on Nov 25 this year in London.

It was the first time the British institution – which was founded in 1866 - had ever conferred a medal on a Chinese space program.

(Executive editor: Zhang Tianyuan)