Tuesday, November 16th, 2004

TDLC and JICA-Net Sign Cooperation Agreement

##The agreement cements a broad plan by the organizations to grow together in three key areas##

The Tokyo Development Learning Center is extremely pleased to announce the signing of a Cooperation Agreement with the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA). The World Bank’s East Asia and Pacific Region Vice President Mr. Jemal-ud-din Kassum and JICA Vice President Mr. Kazuhisa Matsuoka signed the agreement between the JICA-Net team and the TDLC at an informal ceremony at JICA’s Shinjuku headquarters.

The agreement builds on ongoing conversations between JICA President Sadako Ogata and World Bank President James Wolfensohn about ways to increase collaboration between JICA-Net and the Bank’s Global Development Learning Network (GDLN) given the organizations’ common objectives and respective strengths.

The agreement aims to achieve this through the reaffirmation of these objectives, the creation of specific action plans for content sharing and development, and the delegation and secondment of staff to act as focal points for both organizations and to develop cooperative projects.

The TDLC and JICA-Net are taking immediate steps to put this memorandum of understanding into action. In addition to staff assignment currently being finalized, a complementary technical agreement will be signed in the near future between the two networks, and the organizations are already investigating possible projects for joint content development.

“This relationship brings two far-reaching global networks more closely together,” said Mr. Kassum. “We’re very much looking forward to the additional ways our combined strengths and reach can deliver benefits to the development community not only within Asia, but around the world.”

The agreement cements a broad plan by the organizations to grow together in three key areas. The first is the establishment of better and more widespread connectivity between the networks themselves. This increased connectivity then enables a more beneficial and comprehensive dissemination of existing programs. As we subsequently build capacity in this area, we will then embark on a course of shared content development.

The World Bank and JICA are constantly exploring ways to further collaboration and this agreement is a strong signal of greater connectivity throughout both organizations as a whole. The TDLC looks forward to working closely with JICA-Net to develop programs and methods that enable our organizations to more fully realise the benefits of distance learning and knowledge sharing where they are most needed around the world.

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**Related Links:**

JICA -
http://www.jica.go.jp/english/index.html

JICA-Net -
http://jica-net.jica.go.jp/en2/index.html

GDLN -
http://www.gdln.org/