Trevor Manuel Welcomes Launch of Anti-Poverty Network

Partners against poverty: the executive director of J-PAL Africa Kamilla Gumede, Minister Trevor Manuel and the vice chancellor of UCT Dr Max Price.

As host of the launch of J-PAL Africa recently, the vice chancellor Dr Max Price said the close interface between academics at UCT and policymakers in South Africa refuted accusations that universities were ivory towers.

He welcomed delegates from 23 countries for the launch of the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab for Africa (J-PAL Africa), which is the fourth regional office of the J-PAL research network based at MIT. Two of J-PAL's founding directors, Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo, professors of economics at MIT, attended the launch of J-PAL Africa, which will be led by executive director, Kamilla Gumede.

Dr Price said UCT had deep roots in the fight against poverty, as SALDRU, the Southern African Labour and Development Research Unit, (which is now home to J-PAL Africa), has implemented a range of innovative surveys over the past 30 years to grapple with poverty.

He said: "We are privileged to have been given the opportunity to host the African node of J-PAL because it speaks directly to two of our strategic goals – to increase the quality and impact of research as well as to establish UCT as a hub of academic activity between Africa and the rest of the world."

At a private dinner this weekend on the eve of the launch, Trevor Manuel, Minister in the Presidency: National Planning Commission, reflected on the global influence of J-PAL.

"The Poverty Action Lab is a network of academics and practitioners who specialise in this methodology [of randomised evaluations] with the aim of evaluating and testing public policies, trying to figure out what works and drawing lessons and learnings from successful (and unsuccessful) efforts to reduce poverty and inequality and more generally, to improve the quality of public services to the poor," he said.

Reflecting on the country's sluggish social transformation, he said: "South Africa's struggle against Apartheid was never a narrow nationalist struggle for self-determination. From the very beginning, the struggle was characterised by a strong commitment and determination to end apartheid so that the state could act to end poverty, reduce inequality, broaden opportunities and restore justice to society".

Manuel gave an insightful critique of South Africa's failure to wipe out the "shadow of history". His full speech may be read here.

Posted by Carolyn McGibbon on 21/01/2011