New Delhi, Jul 15 (IANS): The Odisha Skills Development Authority (OSDA) has partnered with leading online learning platform Coursera to train 50,000 unemployed youths during the COVID-19 crisis, said a statement on Wednesday.

Launched on the World Youth Skills Day, the partnership is part of Coursera's global roll-out of the 'Workforce Recovery Initiative' where any state and country can provide unemployed workers with free access to online learning.

The programme aims to build in-demand skills like data science, cloud computing and Internet of Things while also offering professional certificates like the Google IT Support Professional Certificate, designed to train people with no tech background for high-demand jobs.

"These are challenging times for the economy and the job market. The crisis has impacted many workers across the state, especially the youth," said OSDA CEO Rashmita Panda.

"As part of the state's commitment towards building a workforce of the future, we are excited to collaborate with Coursera to provide our citizens with access to the world's best learning content, giving them the opportunity to develop the latest digital skills," said Panda.

"Youth unemployment is a major challenge around the world and the pandemic made it worse," said Jeff Maggioncalda, CEO Coursera.

"We are honoured to partner with the government of Odisha in its efforts to transform the state into a global talent hub by providing broad-based skilling opportunities to its youth," the CEO said.

The workforce initiative is part of the Coursera- for-the-government offering launched in 2017 to equip government employees and citizens with in-demand skills.

With this launch, Odisha joins many US states and countries around the world that are using Coursera to offer job relevant online learning to unemployed workers, the statement said.

Learners can enrol in the courses offered through the initiative by September 30 this year and will have access until the end of the year to complete the courses.