Bumpy road to budget deal

Tuesday, 4 August 2009

A US-led push for increases in the budget of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) resulted only in a 2.7% boost after a difficult period of negotiation by its board of governors.

 

IAEA inspectors check fresh nuclear fuel at the Mochovce nuclear power plant in Slovakia. If the world is satisfied with the country's peaceful intentions, could money be saved by simplifying this work? (Image: Dean Calma/IAEA)

It is accepted that the IAEA's role is growing in line with renewed global interest in nuclear power, while it also has a special role as an arbiter of disputes on nuclear technology such as those involving Iran and North Korea. This is at odds with a general policy for United Nations bodies to go for zero growth rates and has resulted in what outgoing director general Mohamed ElBaradei calls "critical needs [that] can no longer be postponed... [and] must be addressed with a sense of urgency."

 

One person that agrees with ElBaradei is US President Barack Obama, whose campaign pledges included doubling the IAEA budget over four years. His concerns are primarily focused on nuclear security and maintaining the IAEA's safeguards capability. Leading the push for greater funds for the agency in 2010 was the USA, whose spokeswoman told World Nuclear News it was extremely happy with securing 2.7% growth for 2010, although it was prepared to go well beyond a reported figure of 8%.

 

Other Western countries though were less keen on a spending boost, the most vocal being Canada, France, Germany and the UK. These countries wanted growth nearer to zero with gains made in efficiency. One particular improvement would be to optimise safeguards checks on countries accepted as behaving in line with the Nuclear non-Proliferation Treaty obligations. Some €121 million ($174 million) goes on this kind of activity per year and an improvement would lighten the load with respect to almost every country that uses nuclear energy. It would also, however, break the principle of treating all member states equally under the treaty terms.

 

The Western countries were united in calling for more money for nuclear security and were successful in shifting certain security funding into the regular budget from its current position of relying 95% on voluntary contributions. But this was a disappointment for less developed nuclear nations which would have preferred to see more funds flowing into technical cooperation projects to increase their mastery of nuclear energy.

 

Of course, the IAEA's core mission of 'Atoms for Peace' is to do both: to enable all countries to enjoy the benefits of nuclear energy as long as they do so safely and do not spread weapons technology. This emerging clash of priorities needs to be resolved, the board decided, and a working group has been set up to define in detail which are the most and least important of the IAEA's main duties in order to guide future spending.

 

A practical measure adopted to address concerns over the IAEA's technical ability was the establishment of a specific fund for capital improvements to the Siebersdorf laboratory, where materials samples - including those from countries under international scrutiny - are processed. Some €80 million ($115 million) in improvements are said to be needed there.  
 
The final agreement reached by the board of governors yesterday means that the IAEA will have a regular budget of €318 million ($458 million) for 2010 with €354.3 million ($510 million) pencilled in for 2011 while a special committee is set up to determine a final 2011 figure and also consider the period 2012-2013. More comes from voluntary donations from leading member states.