“The U.S. government’s international development agency is stepping up its focus on science and technology with a key appointment intended to enhance the agency’s programmes in the Middle East and bolster the Obama administration’s push for science diplomacy,” SciDev.Net reports.

Alex Dehgan, who in March was appointed to the position of USAID’s science and technology advisor, “is widely seen as strengthening the administration’s commitment to science diplomacy – the use of scientific programmes, such as efforts to forge international cooperation among scientists and engineers, to achieve broader political objectives,” the news service writes. The piece includes information about Dehgan’s work as a conservation biologist and an international law attorney,” and his previous employment with the State Department. Additionally, the news service notes, Dehgan “has experience working on large-scale conservation projects in the non-governmental sector.”

“USAID’s focus on science and technology, as well as on the Muslim world, is likely to get a boost from the federal budget for 2011,” SciDev.Net writes (Johnson, 4/8).