Speaking at the second international forum combating poverty organised by the Center for Economic Research and Reforms together with the Uzbekistan Ministry of Employment and Poverty Reduction, Abhijit Banerjee, co-founder and co-director of the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL), highlighted that very little is known about which social programmes work and which do not, and that such programmes are implemented by governments intuitively, rather than on the basis of evidence. He commended Uzbekistan for leading by example in its use of a suite of mechanisms to implement evidence-based social programmes, including by first determining the target audience, its needs, the support required and for whom.
