Nearly 40 years after the cold grey soil of the moon was last disturbed by bounding humans, the lunar surface has become an official destination once more.

Tentative plans to land a man on the moon have been outlined in a document published by the Chinese government that confirms the nation's intention to become a major spacefaring nation. Officials in China have spoken before of their hopes for a crewed lunar mission, but the government document is the first to state the aim as a formal goal for the nation's space agency.

Details of the plan – which would see a human walk on the moon for the first time since Apollo 17 in December 1972 – were published in a white paper that serves as a roadmap for the next five years of Chinese space exploration.

It says China will "push forward human spaceflight projects and make new technological breakthroughs, creating a foundation for future human spaceflight", and describes preparations for orbiting laboratories, space stations and studies that underpin "the preliminary plan for a human lunar landing".

"Chinese people are the same as people around the world. When looking up at the starry sky, we are full of longing and yearning for the vast universe," Zhang Wei, an official with China's National Space Administration, told the Financial Times. Chinese officials have not announced a firm timetable, but the mission could take place around 2025, the chief scientist of the space programme, Ye Peijian, said last year.

China's ambitions in space contrast with an uncomfortable hiatus for the US space agency, Nasa, which lost its ability to send astronauts into space with the retirement of the space shuttle in July.

Under proposals adopted by the Obama administration, US astronauts must now hitch lifts into space aboard Russian Soyuz rockets until private US space companies can take on the job. The strategy aims to leave Nasa free to focus on a new rocket to take astronauts beyond Earth orbit, with a mission to an asteroid on the agenda.

China's rise as a spacefaring nation owes much to a steady programme of investment and development that dates back to the 1950s. While the US and Russia are decades ahead in terms of technology and expertise, both nations' space programmes have suffered from changing priorities of successive governments.

"Assuming the Chinese are serious, which recent history suggests they are, then I believe the impact could be game-changing," said Professor Ken Pounds, a leading figure in UK space research at Leicester University.

"Modern communications will allow the experience of operating on the lunar surface to be delivered into the classroom and living room, with enormous socio-political impact around the world."

Pounds added that the scientific – and commercial – potential of a serious programme of lunar research was likely to be substantial, and go far beyond what was achieved with Apollo.

Another consequence of a Chinese moonshot might be to reinvigorate Nasa's vision of human space exploration.

"It is very unlikely the US would not respond," said Pounds. "That could breathe new life into their space exploration programme, which is currently going nowhere."

In 2003 China became only the third country to send one of its citizens into space independently. Yang Liwei's mission aboard Shenzhou 5 was followed by another substantial milestone when Zhai Zhigang conducted the first Chinese spacewalk five years later.

China has mapped the moon from two orbiting spacecraft and has plans for an unmanned lander, a lunar rover, and a mission to return 2kg of moon rock to Earth by 2020. The space agency this year demonstrated in-orbit rendezvous and docking tests between two spacecraft, laying the foundations for the construction of a future space station.

The emergence of China as a spacefaring nation has the potential to threaten US prestige in space, by inspiring a new generation with headline-grabbing crewed missions.

The former chief administrator at Nasa, Michael Griffin, criticised the Obama administration's plans as an admission that the space agency would not be a major player in human missions into space for the foreseeable future.

Speaking before the Senate in 2007, Griffin said he admired China's achievements in space, but was concerned the country would "leave the United States in its wake".

Reaching for the moon

1959 The Soviet Luna 2 probe became the first artificial object to land on the moonwhen it slammed into the surface in a choreographed collision.

1962 Nasa's Ranger 4 probe was designed to take snapshots of the moon before hitting the surface but failed to return any data after a computer failure.

1966 The Soviet Luna 9 became the first probe to land softly on the moon and send back pictures from the surface.

1966 Nasa's Surveyor 1 probe touched down on the moon soon after Luna 9 and returned more than 11,000 pictures of the moon.

1969 Nasa's Apollo 11 mission puts man on the moon for the first time. Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin lead the way for five more moon landings.

1970 With Luna 16, the Soviets pull off the first automated moon landing and rock sample return mission.

1971 Nasa's Apollo 15 crew become the fourth to land on the moon and the first to explore the surface aboard a rover.

1972 Apollo 17 marks the last time humans walked on the moon.

1976 Luna 24 was the last spacecraft to land softly on the moon. The probe collected 170 grams of lunar dirt and sent it back to Earth.

2009 Nasa's Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite (Lcross) searched for water on the moon and ended its mission by following a spent rocket stage into a crater near the lunar south pole. Lcross took pictures of the impact, which threw up clouds of lunar debris.

2009 China's first lunar probe, Chang'e 1, named after a goddess who flies to the moon, was steered into the lunar surface at the end of its mission. Future probes will aim for a soft landing.