With a donation of a little over $1 million from Japan ($1.17 million), the International Atomic Energy Agency on Tuesday said it had secured the $5.52 million it needed to construct a new second laboratory in Seibersdorf, Austria, which will support global health and development efforts and pair up with a second United Nations program for work on agricultural concerns.
IAEA Director General Yukiya Amano made a plea in September for funding he said was urgently needed to support construction of the Flexible Modular Laboratory. Since then, the United States pledged $3.1 million to the project, while Germany vouchsafed $1.17 million. Norway pledged $117,000 on top of a $352,000 donation it had made earlier.
The new building, said the IAEA, “will become the new home of three laboratories dealing with animal production and health, food safety, soil and water management and crop nutrition, some of the research a joint effort along with the Food and Agricultural Organization of the UN.
The effort is part of a larger initiative that expects to renovate all eight IAEA laboratories in Seibersdorf that are dedicated to research on behalf of nuclear science and technology. It is also “part of a wider project called ReNuAl and the follow up ReNuAl Plus to renovate and modernize all eight of the IAEA's eight laboratories in Seibersdorf … that assist countries in using nuclear science and technology to achieve their development goals,” the agency said on its website.