BERLIN, Nov. 7 (Xinhua) -- Germany plans its unmanned mission to the moon which will begin in 2012 at the earliest, a senior German official said Wednesday.

The German lunar mission, which will cost up to 350 million euros (about 513 million U.S. dollars), is "feasible and useful," Deputy Economy Minister Peter Hintze, the government's aerospace coordinator, told reporters.

"It is also a chance for Germany to prove its competence in this area," he said.

Hintze said Germany will use its leading space technologies, including stereo photography, radar technology and spectral sensing, to put an unmanned space craft into the moon's orbit.

The so-called "Lunar Exploration Orbiter" project is expected to produce a high-resolution, three-dimensional map which will cover several thousand meters below the moon's surface, he said.

Still, the German government will not make its final decision until the first quarter of 2008, he said.