Could South Africa be the country to discover extra-terrestrial life?

South Africa is bidding to build a £1.3 billion telescope that will offer the best chance yet of discovering life on another planet.

Those booking trips to South Africa could soon add a new stop on their trip if the country is successful in bidding for the contract to build the world's largest telescope.

The Square Kilometre Array (SKA) will cost £1.3 billion and offer mankind's best chance of detecting life on another planet.

Using thousands of dishes measuring a square kilometre each to transfer radio waves into pictures, scientists will be able to use the instrument to build images of galaxies light years away that have yet to be seen by a human.

The South African bid is up against another from Australia and New Zealand, with the shortlist having been narrowed from five initial efforts.

A UK-based consortium of 16 nations is funding the venture and will make its decision next year, with construction beginning in 2016 and taking eight years to complete.

With 3,000 antenna dishes to be erected across more than 3,000km of African terrain and stretching from South Africa to Ghana, the task facing the construction firms in charge of the building is monumental.

However, winning the bid will elevate South Africa towards the top of the leader board in terms of science investment - a field it has not traditionally excelled in.

Project scientist and commissioning manager Dr Deborah Shepherd explained why she moved from the US to join the bidding team.

"You have a fresh outlook on things in South Africa," she said. "The innovation that's coming out is incredible. They're not limited by the way things have been done in the past."

SKA project director Dr Bernie Fanaroff added: "A lot of African countries are now recognising the importance of science and technology in development. Africa has not been perceived up to now as a place where you do science and technology, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't be in the future."

Brits booking South Africa adventure trips might enjoy travelling overland between Gondar and Cape Town in a trip that takes in Botswana, Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Tanzania and Zimbabwe.