OdishaPlus Bureau
The Odisha Skill Development Authority (OSDA) on Wednesday signed as many as four memorandums of understanding(MoU) to enhance the skill competency and employability of the State’s youth.
The first MoU was signed between Director, Employment-cum-CEO, OSDA Rashmita Panda, and Deputy Country Representative, UN Women Nishtha Satyam. The partnership with UN Women will lead to the design and implementation of ongoing and new skilling initiatives from a gender perspective and thereby contributing to women empowerment and gender equality.
The second MoU was between Director DTE &T Reghu G and Founder, SAK Robotics Sakhyasingha.SAK Robotics will progressively cover all ITIs in the State to create exposure for ITI students to include robotics skills in their respective domains.
The third MoU was shared between Panda and Jeff Maggioncalda CEO of Coursera for collaboration as a response to COVID-19 pandemic to facilitate the up-skilling and re-skilling of youth from the state of Odisha in the areas of latest courses like Data Science, Technology, etc.
The fourth MoU was shared between OSDA and TimesPro (Partner of SAP) to enable skilled-in-Odisha youth from government engineering and professional institutes to get trained in SAP ERP courses that will enable them to compete in the global market place for better opportunities and also create a talent pool for the Information Technology (IT) Industry across the country including Odisha. The pact was signed between Panda and Anish Srikrishna, CEO, Bennett Coleman and Company Limited (Times Professional Learning) and Rajesh Musaliyath COO Digital Services SAP.
Congratulating everyone on the occasion Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik said, “I am glad to learn that in these testing times when the COVID 19 pandemic has raised new challenges to mankind, the skill ecosystem of Odisha has taken a giant step forward in innovation for facing the emergent challenges.” “I am confident that their collaborations will lead to more opportunities for our youth at the global level and will make skill aspirational for them,” he added. Chairman OSDA Subroto Bagchi and Minister SD& TE Department Premanand Nayak also addressed the digital meet.
Notably, the MoUs were signed as the State celebrated the World Youth Skills Day (WYSD). The aim of WYSD is to recognize the strategic importance of equipping young people with skills for employment, decent work, and entrepreneurship and to highlight the crucial role of skilled youth in addressing current and future global challenges.