The official theme of the 2001IAF Congress is "Meeting the Needs of the New Millennium". Without doubt, humans' most urgent need at the start of the new millennium is the continuation of economic growth, which is the only means by which the great majority of the world population can lift themselves out of the poverty in which they live. A sine qua non for continuing economic growth is for the rich countries to continue to develop new industries ― as they did throughout the 20th century, thereby creating high-productivity employment for hundreds of millions of people around the world. Arguably the most significant of these was the development of passenger air travel from zero in 1901 to 1.5 billion passengers per year by 2001. It has recently become clear that passenger space travel could grow to reach a similar scale ― and that no other space activity has anywhere near comparable potential. The paper describes the potential contribution to world economic growth of developing passenger space travel; the failure of government space agencies either to aid this development or to make a significant contribution to economic growth; and the value for economic policy of prioritising the realisation of passenger space travel The faster that passenger space travel services grow, the more the space industry will contribute to "Meeting the Needs of the New Millennium".
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