Accounting for the impact of space policies: The case of the Italian Space Agency

The purpose of this work is assessing the impact of the Italian Space Agency (ASI) on the performance of the Italian space stakeholders through three specific policies, i.e. public procurement, public investment in Earth observation, and collaboration with the scientific community. This article explores multiple surveys targeting upstream and downstream companies, universities, and research centres in the space economy to estimates the cost-benefit ratio. We find that the socio-economic benefit of ASI policies is positive and, when considering upstream companies and downstream intermediate users in the field of Earth observation (EO), the impact is particularly high in the EO sector. The surveys show evidence of a positive effect of public procurement and EO data on the Italian space economy, both in terms of innovation and economic performance. Finally, we observe a significant impact of ASI also on the scientific community.