Artificial Intelligence (AI) is transforming economies, public services, healthcare, education, and industries across the world. While the technology is creating new opportunities, it is also raising important questions about accessibility, employment, infrastructure, and the distribution of its benefits. The real challenge is not simply adopting AI but ensuring that its advantages reach people across countries, communities, and economic backgrounds.
For developing regions such as Africa, this transition presents both an opportunity and a concern. While AI can help address long-standing gaps in infrastructure and public services, limited digital infrastructure, uneven access to technology, and a shortage of skilled professionals could widen existing inequalities. The focus, therefore, must be on democratising AI and ensuring that developing economies become active participants in shaping its future.
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Making AI Accessible Beyond Geographical Boundaries
AI is already changing how people access information and interact with technology. One of its most significant contributions is its ability to make knowledge more accessible, regardless of geographical location or language.
Language has traditionally remained a major barrier to accessing global information, particularly for communities where English is not widely spoken. AI-powered language technologies can help bridge this gap by allowing people to access information in their own languages.
India, with its 22 scheduled languages and growing digital ecosystem, offers an important example of how technology can reach people across diverse linguistic communities. Similar developments in Africa could help expand access to education, public information, and digital services.
Morocco, for instance, is working towards strengthening its AI ecosystem, with an ambition to generate $10 billion in GDP through AI by 2030. Its efforts to develop AI capabilities in local languages reflect the importance of making advanced technology relevant to local communities.
India’s Role in Strengthening Africa’s AI Ecosystem
India has made considerable progress in technology adoption, digital infrastructure, and AI development. Its experience presents opportunities for collaboration with African countries, particularly as both regions work towards strengthening their position in the global digital economy.
Africa has significant natural resources, including minerals required for manufacturing semiconductors and developing advanced technologies. However, a major concern is that the continent often supplies these resources without receiving an equivalent share of the value created through their processing and technological application.
This creates the risk of continuing an extraction-based economic model, where raw materials are sourced from Africa, converted into advanced products elsewhere, and eventually sold back to the same markets.
A similar challenge exists in the area of human capital. Skilled professionals from developing countries are frequently recruited by more advanced economies, creating a shortage of specialised talent in their home countries. While India has a comparatively large engineering workforce, African countries face greater challenges in retaining and developing technical talent.
India’s engagement with Africa can help address these gaps through knowledge exchange, capacity building, technology partnerships, and collaborative AI initiatives. Such cooperation can ensure that African countries participate in developing technology rather than remaining only consumers of it.
AI Can Transform Healthcare and Education
Healthcare and education represent two of the most promising areas where AI can make a meaningful difference, particularly in regions facing shortages of infrastructure and specialised professionals.
AI-assisted healthcare solutions can help improve diagnostic accuracy and make medical expertise more accessible. An example shared during the address involved a patient who had undergone several medical examinations in Morocco and abroad without receiving a clear diagnosis. After his medical reports, scans, and other test results were analysed through an advanced AI-based application, the technology helped narrow down the possible conditions by eliminating several diagnoses. This eventually led doctors to investigate tuberculosis, and the patient responded positively to the treatment.
The example demonstrates how AI can support medical professionals in identifying possibilities that may otherwise take considerable time and resources to investigate. In regions with limited access to specialised hospitals, such technologies could strengthen diagnostic support and telemedicine services.
Education offers another significant opportunity. Many African countries continue to face challenges related to teacher availability, educational infrastructure, and access to learning resources. AI-powered platforms can help bridge these gaps by making educational content and information available to students in different languages and locations.
By improving access to knowledge, AI can help reduce geographical and linguistic barriers while creating new opportunities for learning and skill development.
Addressing the Challenges of Skills and Employment
Despite its opportunities, AI will also transform the employment landscape. Automation may replace certain existing roles, while simultaneously creating demand for new and specialised skills.
Preparing the workforce for this transition is particularly important for developing economies. Countries need to invest in education, technical training, and digital literacy to ensure that their populations can participate in the emerging AI-driven economy.
The challenge is not limited to creating skilled professionals but also retaining them. Developing countries must build stronger research environments, innovation ecosystems, and employment opportunities so that their talent contributes to domestic development.
For Africa and the wider Global South, developing human capital will be essential to ensuring that AI becomes a source of economic opportunity rather than another factor contributing to inequality.
Building Responsible and Sustainable AI Infrastructure
Another important concern is the infrastructure required to support AI. Advanced AI systems depend on large data centres, significant computing capacity, and substantial energy resources.
As AI adoption increases, the demand for electricity will also rise. This raises questions about whether countries have sufficient energy infrastructure to support the expansion of data centres and other technology facilities.
The growing dependence on energy-intensive infrastructure makes renewable energy an important part of the discussion. Countries must explore how green energy can support the development of AI while limiting its environmental impact.
Responsible AI adoption is equally important. As technology becomes more accessible, there is a need to establish safeguards against misuse, including large-scale fraud and other harmful applications. Data governance, accountability, and appropriate regulatory frameworks must develop alongside technological capabilities.
Democratising AI should therefore go hand in hand with ensuring its responsible use, particularly as its influence extends to younger generations and everyday public services.
Shaping the Future of AI Through Global Collaboration
The AI revolution is no longer a question of whether developing countries will adopt the technology. The more important question is whether they will actively shape its direction or simply experience its consequences.
India has an opportunity to play a significant role in strengthening AI capabilities across the Global South through partnerships, technology exchange, and collaborative initiatives. African countries, meanwhile, must focus on developing their own AI ecosystems, strengthening local capabilities, and ensuring that their natural and human resources contribute to domestic innovation.
The future of AI must be built around accessibility, shared knowledge, local innovation, and responsible development. Ensuring that developing economies have the infrastructure, skills, and opportunities to participate will be essential to making the technology beneficial for a larger section of humanity.
Insights shared by Mohamed Maliki, Ambassador Extraordinary & Plenipotentiary, Embassy of the Kingdom of Morocco, New Delhi, during the World AI Summit 2026, organised by Elets Technomedia.