¡¡¡¡BEIJING, Oct. 16 (Xinhuanet) -- The Chinese government has in all allocated 18 billion yuan (about 2.2 billion US dollars) to its manned space program by the time of successful return of the Shenzhou-5 space vehicle Thursday morning, according to a press release Thursday.

¡¡¡¡The fund was mainly used for scientific research, manufacturingof equipment and instruments, the construction of essential facilities for research and tests, and consequently a system complete with all necessary departments of research, production and test related to manned spaceflight was established. Enditem