Bhubaneswar: As part of 5T initiative, the Odisha Government has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL) South Asia, co-founded by Nobel Laureates, Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo to maximise impact of anti-poverty programmes.
Under the MoU, J-PAL will to provide technical assistance to scale up evidence-based programmes to improve development outcomes. The agreement was signed by Development Commissioner Suresh Mohapatra and J-PAL Executive Director South Asia Shobhini Mukerji at Kharvela Bhawan in the presence of Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik.
Under the partnership, J-PAL South Asia will collaborate with Odisha Government on specific themes like malnutrition reduction, prevention of distress migration, women’s empowerment, increasing agricultural productivity and improving health outcomes.
J-PAL will work with concerned departments including but not limited to, Labour, Education, Health, and Women and Child Development, to conduct policy-relevant randomised evaluations of new anti-poverty and development programmes and for specific outcome related interventions as well.
Additionally, a diagnostic exercise and subsequent workshops will be conducted to build state capacity in the area of monitoring and evaluation.
Speaking on the occasion, the Chief Minister said this partnership was in line with the 5T initiative of Odisha which also seeks to partner with leading global benchmark setters and will augment the State’s efforts to create an empowered Odisha.
“J-PAL South Asia is very excited to enter into collaboration with the Government of Odisha, which has been focusing on transforming outcomes and improving efficiency through a number of different initiatives,” said J-PAL South Asia Executive Director Shobhini Mukerji.
“We look forward to working closely with them on this journey of advancing evidence informed policymaking in the state,” she added.
