UN peacekeeping is a vital instrument for peace. Currently, more than 95,000 uniformed personnel, provided by some 115 countries, are engaged in peacekeeping operations around the world.
UN environmental conventions have helped reduce acid rain in Europe and North America, cut marine pollution worldwide, and phase out production of gases destroying the Earth's ozone layer.
The UN and its agencies, including the World Bank and the UN Development Programme, are the premier vehicle for furthering development in poorer countries, providing assistance worth $30 billion a year.
More international law has been developed through the UN in the past six decades than in all previous history.
With support from the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization – a joint effort of UNICEF, WHO, the World Bank Group, private foundations, the pharmaceutical industry and governments – over 5 million deaths have been averted since 2000.
The WFP provides 4.5 million tons of food for 100 million people in 80 countries every year.
UN appealsraise more than $8 billion every year for emergency assistance to victims of war and natural disaster.
Smallpox was eradicated from the world through a global campaign coordinated by WHO.
Five million people who would have been paralyzed are walking today because of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative, launched in 1988 by WHO, UNICEF, the United States Centers for Disease Control and Rotary International - reducing the incidence of polio worldwide by more than 99 per cent.
Expenditures of the UN System for economic and social programmes to help the world's poorest countries - through UNICEF, WFP, UNDP and others - amounted to some $22.1 billion in 2009. That was less than 0.9 per cent of the world military expenditures, estimated at $1,531 billion.
