I welcome this opportunity to celebrate with you the 20th anniversary of the opening of the Vienna International Centre (VIC). Over the last two decades, the VIC has acted as the headquarters for a number of independent international organizations - organizations which have different mandates and membership but which share the common objectives of the United Nations: namely the search for peace and security; the promotion of human development; and the protection of human rights.
In my remarks to you today, I would like briefly to talk about the work of the International Atomic Energy Agency, founded over 42 years ago. I will explain how we are contributing to two of the objectives I just mentioned: human development and security.
The mandate of the Agency is to maximize the benefits of nuclear energy for peace and development. The term 'nuclear energy' is used to cover both generation of electricity as well as the applications of nuclear and radiation techniques in such areas as human health, agriculture, environmental monitoring and water resources management. In that process the Agency has the responsibility to help ensure that safety in all the applications of nuclear energy is maintained at a high level and to verify States' commitments to use nuclear energy exclusively for peaceful purposes.
Let me start with our role related to nuclear power. Nuclear power provides 16% of the world electricity supply. The choice of a particular energy mix is naturally a national decision that takes into account the particular circumstances of each State; the Agency's role is to act as an objective scientific institution for expert advice and standard setting. Our aim is to ensure that national authorities have all the required data to make informed choices that meet their growing energy needs and assist those who decided to make use of nuclear power to attain the highest levels of safety. Nuclear power is one of the few options that can provide large scale electricity generation with virtually no greenhouse gas emissions. Nuclear power therefore is a sustainable source of energy. However, its future depends on the nuclear power industry being able to consistently reflect three crucial attributes: safety, competitiveness and public support.
The Agency, as I mentioned, is concerned with much more than nuclear power. In non-energy sectors, nuclear technology is making a valuable contribution to human welfare and sustainable development. One of the key sectors of the Agency's work is in helping countries - especially in the developing world - to enjoy the benefits of nuclear applications to meet development needs. We do this through a programme of information dissemination and technology transfer covering such diverse areas as the assessment of nutritional deficiencies in women and children, the control of radiation doses to radiotherapy patients, the eradication of insect pests, the improvement of crop yields and the enhancement of water resources management. Much of this work is done through our Technical Co-operation programme, which currently amounts to over one hundred million dollars per year.
The contribution of nuclear energy to peace and development is, however, influenced to a great extent by the degree of public trust in the safety of nuclear installations, in the safety of waste disposal and in the safe use of radioactive sources. While safety will always remain the responsibility of national governments, the Chernobyl accident demonstrated to the world that international co-operation is a sine qua non for the continued use of nuclear energy. The Agency is playing a fundamental role here in contributing to the establishment of a global safety regime and a comprehensive safety culture. It does this by promoting legally binding international agreements, developing safety standards and providing safety review services.
Public attitudes towards nuclear energy are influenced also by apprehensions regarding its use for military purposes. And this brings me to the Agency's role in verifying the peaceful use of nuclear energy. For much of its existence, the verification work of the Agency - what is referred to in the Statute as 'safeguards' - was focused mainly on declared nuclear material, that is materials that were declared by the State. The failure of this system in Iraq made it clear that any effective verification system must put equal emphasis on the possibility of undeclared nuclear material and activities. In recent years, therefore, the Agency has made a consistent effort to strengthen its verification system. Today we are proud to have a new system of verification under which the Agency is able to develop a comprehensive picture of all nuclear activities in a State and thus provide assurances to the international community that States are respecting their peaceful use commitments. In other words, providing assurance that those who committed themselves not to make nuclear weapons are in fact living up to their commitments. I should note that over 180 States have made such commitments under the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons and under regional treaties.
Another aspect of the Agency's work that is related to the peaceful use of nuclear energy is its activities relevant to the "physical protection" of nuclear and radioactive materials, that is to assist States to ensure that these materials do not fall into the wrong hands. Together with international customs and police organizations, we are developing measures to help prevent smuggling and illegal trafficking in those items.
The Agency's verification role is likely to be extended in the near future from curbing the spread of nuclear weapons to reducing existing stockpiles. Over the past few years, we have been involved in discussions with the Russian Federation and the United States of America to develop arrangements for Agency verification that nuclear material removed from weapon programmes in these two countries remains irreversibly in peaceful activities. Furthermore, if international negotiations on a treaty for the prohibition of the production of fissile material for nuclear weapons were to succeed, many States would look to the Agency to verify such a Treaty. In my view, verifying the freeze of the production of fissile material for weapon purposes and verifying the gradual reductions in weapon stockpiles would bring the Agency to centre stage in the efforts to achieve the long cherished goal of a world free from nuclear weapons. The efforts to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons and to move toward nuclear disarmament have been built upon a regime which is impressive but fragile at the same time. We need to continue to work towards the universality of that regime, towards nuclear disarmament and towards a better system of collective security. These are the strongest disincentives against the use of nuclear energy for weapons purposes.
As I said at the beginning, we share common goals with other international organizations in Vienna: human development and security. And as we continue our work to these ends, I would like to conclude by reiterating our sense of gratitude to the Austrian Government for its continued support and gracious hospitality.