Company Profile
International Atomic Energy Agency
Company Overview
The IAEA offers a dynamic, multicultural work environment. Its staff comes from over 100 countries and works in a wide range of technical and scientific fields.
The IAEA has a world-class, diverse and multi-disciplinary workforce. With more than 2,500 staff working in a wide range of nuclear and related disciplines, it draws on their expertise to ensure the peaceful use of nuclear material and application of nuclear techniques for sustainable development.
The Agency’s Headquarters is in Vienna, Austria, where the majority of staff is located. The IAEA also maintains regional offices in Toronto and Tokyo, liaison offices in New York and Geneva, and research laboratories in Seibersdorf, Austria, and in Monaco.
The IAEA offers a variety of work arrangements to meet the needs of its diverse staff. This includes flexible working hours, part-time work and job-sharing arrangements. The IAEA has a generous benefits and entitlements package, including paid time off, maternity and paternity leave, health insurance, a pension programme, education grants, and other benefits, which are determined by type of contract.
Company History
The IAEA was created in 1957 in response to the deep fears and expectations generated by the discoveries and diverse uses of nuclear technology. The Agency’s genesis was U.S. President Eisenhower’s “Atoms for Peace” address to the General Assembly of the United Nations on 8 December 1953.
The U.S. Ratification of the Statute by President Eisenhower, 29 July 1957, marks the official birth of the International Atomic Energy Agency. In the press conference following the signing ceremony in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington, D.C., President Eisenhower evoked his address to the UN General Assembly in December 1953, at which he had proposed to establish the IAEA.
The IAEA is strongly linked to nuclear technology and its controversial applications, either as a weapon or as a practical and useful tool. The ideas President Eisenhower expressed in his speech in 1953 helped shape the IAEA’s Statute, which 81 nations unanimously approved in October 1956.
The Agency was set up as the world’s “Atoms for Peace” organization within the United Nations family. From the beginning, it was given the mandate to work with its Member States and multiple partners worldwide to promote safe, secure and peaceful nuclear technologies. The objectives of the IAEA’s dual mission – to promote and control the Atom – are defined in Article II of the IAEA Statute.
In October 1957, the delegates to the First General Conference decided to establish the IAEA’s headquarters in Vienna, Austria. Until the opening of the Vienna International Centre in August 1979, the old Grand Hotel next to the Vienna Opera House served as the Agency’s temporary headquarters.
The IAEA has also two regional offices located in Toronto, Canada (since 1979) and Tokyo, Japan (since 1984), as well as two liaison offices in New York City, United States of America (since 1957) and Geneva, Switzerland (since 1965). The Agency runs laboratories specialized in nuclear technology in Vienna and Seibersdorf, Austria, opened in 1961, and, since 1961, in Monaco.
Notable Accomplishments / Recognition
In October 2005, Mr. ElBaradei and the IAEA were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize "for their efforts to prevent nuclear energy from being used for military purposes and to ensure that nuclear energy for peaceful purposes is used in the safest possible way."
Benefits
Salary and Post Adjustment
Salaries are determined within the framework of the United Nations Common System and are paid in the currency of the duty station.
Post adjustment is an amount paid in addition to the net base salary, which varies according to the cost of living at each duty station in comparison to New York (the base of the UN remuneration system). It is designed to ensure that no matter where the United Nations Common System staff work, their take-home pay has a purchasing power equivalent to that at the base of the system. Together, base salary and post adjustment form the net remuneration.
Relocation
The IAEA usually meets the costs of travel from the place of recruitment to the duty station in the case of new, internationally recruited staff members and their eligible dependants. It also usually assists with arranging for the shipping or storing and insuring household effects. Assistance with visa formalities may be provided. Upon arrival, staff members recruited from outside the duty station and appointed for at least one year receive a settling-in grant for covering initial expenses.
Health insurance
Medical insurance coverage is a scheme covering medical and hospital expenses. Normally staff members and their eligible dependants will be enrolled on a cost-sharing basis either in the Agency's health insurance scheme, which provides reasonable coverage for medical and hospital costs and some coverage for dental treatment. As an alternative in some cases, staff can enroll in the Austrian national health insurance scheme, with an optional supplementary insurance plan.
In special cases, approval may be granted to continue participation in health insurance schemes other than the Agency's.
Life insurance
Staff members have the possibility of enrolling, at their own expense, in a group life insurance scheme with several levels of coverage.
Pension plan
The United Nations Joint Staff Pension Fund (UNJSPF) is a fund established by the General Assembly of the United Nations to provide retirement, death, disability, and related benefits for the staff of the United Nations and other member organizations admitted to membership in the fund.
Staff members are required to participate in the UNJSPF, for which they contribute 7.9% and the Agency contributes 15.8% of their pensionable remuneration. Staff members leaving the Agency before completion of five years of contributory service will be reimbursed the amount of their own contributions plus 3.25% interest.
After the completion of 5 years, staff members would be eligible for a deferred retirement benefit, early retirement benefit or normal retirement benefit depending on their age upon separation.
Staff members may exceptionally be authorized to continue to participate in a national pension insurance scheme or the pension scheme of their former employer.
Rental subsidy
The rental subsidy scheme aims at ensuring a greater degree of equity and alleviating hardship by subsidizing housing for newcomers whose rental costs significantly exceed the average for the duty station. Newly appointed staff members in the Professional and above categories, or staff members with international benefits transferred from one duty station to another, may be eligible for rental subsidy as a newcomer, for a maximum period of seven years from the date of arrival to the duty station. The rental subsidy shall not exceed 40 per cent of the actual rent paid by the staff member.
Dependency allowance
Dependency benefits are payable to Professional staff members for both dependent spouses whose annual gross earnings are under a certain threshold, and for children under the age of 21 for whom the staff member provides main and continuing financial support. Staff members will only receive the allowance for dependent children between the ages of 18 and 21 if they are in full-time attendance at a school, university or similar educational institution. Staff members who do not have a dependent spouse may be eligible to receive a secondary dependant allowance for a parent or sibling under certain conditions.
Education grant
An education grant is payable, if supported by documentary evidence, in respect of each child who is in full-time attendance at a recognized school or university.
The grant is payable from the scholastic year following the child's fifth birthday, or in which he/she completed his/her fifth year, provided this age is attained during the first term of that scholastic year. The grant shall be payable until the end of the fourth year of post-secondary studies or the award of the first recognized degree, whichever is earlier. The grant will not be paid beyond the scholastic year in which the child reaches the age of 25.
Repatriation grant
Upon separation from service, a staff member who has completed at least five years of service outside his/her home country and whom the Agency is liable to repatriate is paid a repatriation grant. Payment of the repatriation grant shall be subject to evidence of relocation. The amount is linked to the staff member's dependency status and the length of service with the IAEA.
Home leave
Travel expenses of an eligible staff member and his/her eligible primary dependants are paid to and from his/her home country to enable him/her to take leave there once every two years of qualifying service. The first home leave will fall due in the second year of a staff member's service.
Family visit
Travel expenses of an eligible staff member may be paid for the purpose of visiting his/her spouse and dependency child or children who are residing at the place of recruitment, the place of home leave or the previous duty station when during the preceding twelve months neither the spouse nor a dependent child has been present at the duty station after travel at the Agency's expense, except on education grant travel. Family visit travel may be granted only once every two years of qualifying service and the staff member must have completed at least one year of continuous service at the duty station after initial appointment.
Additional benefits and entitlements
In addition to the benefits detailed above, the IAEA offers its staff annual leave at a rate of 2.5 days per month, sick leave entitlement and parental leave entitlement, among others.