Washington

The US Department of State announced last week that it will employ Jack Gibbons, former science adviser to President Bill Clinton, as a consultant to help guide its consideration of a critical report from the National Research Council (NRC) on its understanding and use of science.

The report, which reflects pressure from both the scientific community and Congress, calls for extensive changes in training and organization to boost the role of science and technology in US foreign policy. The department's move is seen as a commitment to achieve this.

Madeleine Albright, the secretary of state, also promised to meet with Bruce Alberts, the president of the National Academy of Sciences, to discuss the report, as soon as her schedule permits. Alberts first asked for such a meeting a year ago.

The State Department has promised many times to address accusations that it ignores science, but changes have been slow in coming. For example, senior officials have pledged twice in the past two years that a senior scientific adviser would be appointed, but no such appopintment has been made.

The drive for reform seems to have gained new impetus after the Senate passed a foreign-relations bill requiring the department to appoint a science adviser and to report back to the Congress on how it plans to implement the NRC's recommendations. The bill is expected shortly to become law.

The NRC says the State Department should train all foreign-service officers and diplomats to give them “basic competence in scientific, technological and health matters”, and that it should appoint 25 scientifically qualified senior diplomats at its foreign embassies.

But Glenn Schweitzer, the director of the NRC study, says its most important recommendation is that the secretary of state should establish a science and technology policy, together with an “action agenda” to implement it.

“We're pleased that the committee has done such a thorough job,” says Ken Brill, acting assistant secretary for oceans, environment and science at the State Department. Brill says the department is facing “a new set of issues, many of them science-based” and that it plans to respond to the challenge. Gibbons, he says, will help the department come up with a science adviser's position “that will be effective”.