Bhubaneswar, Nov 5: The Odisha government has entered into a three-year partnership with the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL) South Asia to strengthen evidence-based policymaking and improve the effectiveness of government programmes across the state.

The Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed on Wednesday by Rashmi Kabi, FA-cum-Additional Secretary in the Planning and Convergence Department, and Shobhini Mukerji, Executive Director of J-PAL South Asia.

The signing ceremony was attended by Chief Secretary Anu Garg, Development Commissioner-cum-Additional Chief Secretary Deoranjan Kumar Singh, J-PAL South Asia Acting Associate Director (Policy) Murali Mallikarjunan and secretaries from various state government departments.

Under the agreement, J-PAL South Asia will work closely with different government departments to identify key policy challenges, undertake rigorous research and provide recommendations based on evidence. The collaboration will also focus on adapting successful policy interventions to Odisha's requirements and evaluating their effectiveness before wider implementation.

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The partnership is aligned with the state's long-term development roadmap, Odisha Vision 2036 and 2047, which aims to transform the state into Samruddha Odisha by 2036 and Viksit Odisha by 2047.

The collaboration builds on J-PAL South Asia's engagement with Odisha since 2006. Its previous areas of work in the state include early childhood education, foundational literacy and numeracy, governance, sanitation, agriculture and gender equality.

One of the ongoing initiatives highlighted under the partnership is Barnali, a gender-equity curriculum currently being implemented in approximately 23,000 government schools. J-PAL South Asia serves as the knowledge and research partner to the School and Mass Education Department and Breakthrough Trust for the initiative.

The implementation of the MoU will be overseen by a Steering Committee chaired by the Chief Secretary, with senior government officials and J-PAL South Asia representatives as members. The committee will meet every six months to examine project proposals and review progress. Nodal officers from both sides will coordinate the activities, while individual projects and their deliverables will be finalised in consultation with the concerned departments.

Speaking on the occasion, Chief Secretary Anu Garg said the state had set an ambitious target of achieving Viksit Odisha as part of the broader Viksit Bharat vision.

She emphasised the importance of collaborating with research institutions, testing innovative approaches and adopting data- and artificial intelligence-based interventions in line with global best practices.

Garg outlined three key areas where J-PAL could contribute: bringing relevant global research to the state's policy priorities, adapting proven approaches to local requirements, and helping government departments design and test evidence-based solutions before expanding them across the state.

J-PAL South Asia Executive Director Shobhini Mukerji said Odisha had a longstanding record of generating and applying research-based evidence in governance and policymaking.

She said the organisation would continue working with the state government to identify policy priorities, incorporate global research findings, develop locally relevant programmes and evaluate interventions to determine what works before scaling them up. The partnership would also build on the state's existing monitoring and evaluation capabilities.

J-PAL is an international research network that promotes the use of scientific evidence in policymaking, particularly through randomised evaluations to identify effective approaches to reducing poverty.

Its network comprises more than 1,000 affiliated researchers and has undertaken over 2,500 ongoing and completed randomised evaluations. Its co-founders and directors, Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo, were awarded the 2019 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences for their experimental approach to alleviating global poverty. (With ANI inputs)