At the invitation of President Xi Jinping of the People's Republic of China, French President Emmanuel Macron paid a state visit to China from April 5 to 7, 2023. The two governments signed a joint statement, aiming to open up new prospects for Sino-French cooperation and seek new impetus for the development of Sino-European relations.

The Sino-French joint statement has 51 clauses, and the 22nd clause states that both countries are satisfied with the cooperation between their the space agencies on Chang'e-6 mission and the joint studies of extraterrestrial samples.

China aims to launch the Chang'e-6 probe to collect samples on the far side of the moon around 2025.

On the occasion of the state visit to France of Chinese President Xi Jinping in 2019, heads of China National Space Administration (CNSA) and France's Centre National d'études Spatiales (CNES) signed an agreement on future space cooperation between the two nations at the Elysée Palace in Paris. China will fly French experiments on its Chang'e-6 mission to return samples from the Moon.

In October 2018, China-France Oceanography Satellite, known as the CFOSat, designed to observe ocean-atmosphere exchanges, particularly between winds and waves, was launched from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center, Northwest China's Gansu Province. Chinese President Xi Jinping and French President Emmanuel Macron exchanged congratulatory messages to mark the launch of CFOSat.