This handout photo released by NASA shows a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying the company's Crew Dragon spacecraft launched from Launch Complex 39A on NASA's SpaceX Demo-2 mission to the International Space Station with NASA astronauts Robert Behnken and Douglas Hurley onboard at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Saturday. Photo: AFP

Russia on Sunday put a brave face on the loss of its space travel monopoly, saying it planned to test two new rockets in 2020 and resume its lunar program in 2021.

The comments from the Russian space agency Roscosmoc came after US entrepreneur Elon Musk's SpaceX became the world's first commercial company to put humans into orbit, signaling the dawn of a new era.

Russia had for many years enjoyed a monopoly as the only country that was able to ferry astronauts to the International Space Station, and Saturday's flawless US launch meant the loss of a sizable income for Moscow.

"We are not planning to sit idle," said Roscosmos spokesman Vladimir Ustimenko.

"Already this year we will conduct tests of two new rockets and resume our lunar program next year," Ustimenko tweeted.

He did not elaborate but Russian space agency chief Dmitry Rogozin has said earlier the country planned to conduct a new test launch of the Angara heavy carrier rocket this autumn.

Rogozin has also said that Russia is pressing ahead with the development of its new intercontinental ballistic missile, the Sarmat.

In 2018, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that the Sarmat was one of the new Russian weapons that could render NATO defenses obsolete.

The Russian space agency has earned large sums by ferrying US astronauts to the International Space Station: A seat in the Soyuz costs NASA around $80 million.

On Sunday, Roscosmos rushed to point out that the US still needed Moscow.

"It's very important to have at least two possibilities to make it to the station. Because you never know..." spokesman Ustimenko said.

The Russian space program is renowned for having sent the first man into space in 1961 and launching the first satellite in 1957.

However, since the collapse of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) in 1991, the country has lost expensive spacecraft and satellites in recent years.

AFP