New Delhi: Leaders from G20 Troika, comprising India, Brazil and South Africa, announced a joint declaration on Tuesday emphasising that digital public infrastructure (DPI) augmented by artifical intelligence (AI) will enable using data for development, employment creation and delivering better health and education outcomes.
The declaration on Digital Public Infrastructure, AI and Data for Governance stresses on inclusive digital transformation for accelerating progress towards Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). A joint statement in this regard was endorsed by several G20 countries, guest countries and international organisations.
DPI and AI has potential to transform lives
According to the communique, "The experiences of several G20 countries have demonstrated that well-designed digital public infrastructure augmented by artificial intelligence can enable the use of data for development, creating new jobs and delivering better health and education outcomes. Their adoption by G20 countries more widely has the potential to radically transform the lives of citizens thereby renewing their faith in vibrant democratic principles".
It has pointed out that global growth at just over three percent is the lowest since the turn of the century when an average of nearly four percent prevailed till the pandemic. "At the same time, technology is moving at dizzying pace, and if equitably deployed, affords us a historic opportunity to raise growth, reduce inequality and take one giant step towards bridging the gap in attaining the Sustainable Development Goals. Accelerating progress towards the SDGs requires inclusive digital transformation," a statement issued by MEA read.
Highlighting inclusive, development-oriented technological ecosystems
Recalling the adoption of Global Digital Compact at the UN Summit of the Future, leaders have welcomed the Global DPI Summit held in Cairo, Egypt in 2024. Emphasising on inclusive, development-oriented and secure technological ecosystems, they said that benefits of growth with job creation can be unlocked only when technological systems focus on each citizen, enabling small and large businesses to connect to them to improve the livelihood of families and neighbourhoods.
The declaration stated that systems that follow common design principles, including open, modular, interoperable and scalable, enable the private sector serving diverse sectors such as ecommerce, health, education and finance to connect to the technological system and to each other.
Technology-neutral approach minimises disparities in digital economy
In order to get a seamless transition of technology one requires pursuing a technology-neutral approach to create a level-playing field for market participants and for the deployment and proliferation of DPI, AI and data for development. "This approach is conducive to supporting greater competition and innovation, and towards stimulating wider economic development and reducing asymmetries in the digital economy," the communique added.
It has pointed out that establishment of fair and equitable principles for data governance is required to address data protection and management, privacy and security while offering market participants the protection of intellectual property rights and their confidential information.
Leaders highlighted that trust is the cornerstone of most flourishing democracies and building public trust requires transparency in operation, appropriate safeguards to rights of citizens, and fairness in their governance. Therefore, foundation and frontier AI models, which are trained on diverse and properly representative data, are essential so that they benefit diverse societies across the globe.
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