OREANDA-NEWS. January 26, 2011.  Prime Minister Vladimir Putin ordered the government to complete the paperwork for the construction of the Vostochny spaceport as soon as possible so that work begins this year as planned.

"We are talking about a new, big national project," he told a weekly Presidium meeting. "Construction must begin precisely on schedule."

To be built at an estimated cost of at least 80.5 billion rubles (USD 2.7 billion), the spaceport is designed to ease the country’s dependence on the Soviet-era Baikonur launch site, located in the wind-swept steppe of neighboring Kazakhstan and which Russia is leasing through 2050. Joint launches from France's Kuru site in Guyana will begin sometime in the first half of this year, but the growing amount of business justifies a new national spaceport, Putin said.

The Prime Minister visited Vostochny, located in the middle of the Siberian taiga near the Chinese border, in August, during his memorable ride throughout the region in a yellow Lada.

There are 21 spaceports worldwide, owed by 11 countries, including Russia — which in 2009 claimed 40 percent of the highly competitive market for space launches. But such countries as China, South Korea, Indonesia and Brazil are building more of them, according to the government.