English: IAEA Scientific Forum 2001: "Focus on Nuclear Technology’s Role in Serving Human Needs", at the 45th General Conference, IAEA, Vienna, Austria. 19 September 2001

In the developing world, nuclear science and technology applied at the village level, is providing an alternative to suffering for some of the world's poorest people. In Africa it promises to eradicate the tsetse fly, carrier of sleeping sickness and nagana, a disease that binds millions of rural people to poverty by killing their livestock, the source of draught power. In Asia isotope hydrology techniques are helping to relieve the plight of millions of people in Bangladesh, whose drinking water is contaminated by arsenic. In Latin America isotopic and nuclear techniques are being used as tools in the fight against malnutrition.

Invited Speakers: Jeffrey Sachs, Director of the Centre for International Development at Harvard University in the USA (via video-conference)

Jose Vargas, former Minister of Science and Technology in Brazil

Margaret Catley-Carlson, Chairman, Global Water Partnership

Photo Credit: Dean Calma / IAEA