Bridging The Digital Divide In The AI Era – The UNDP Way

A Bangladeshi villager has her photograph and signature taken and saved to an extensive database. In a world where digital transformation is rapidly reshaping the contours of global development, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) emerges as a pivotal player. The UNDP, with its extensive reach across 170 countries, holds a unique position at the intersection of technology, governance, and social welfare, orchestrating digital strategies that tackle everything from poverty eradication to climate change. At the bustling Web Summit in Lisbon , I spoke with the UNDP’s Chief Digital Officer, Robert Opp. Our conversation delved into the intricacies of harnessing digital technologies for societal advancement, particularly in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, that, in many ways, acted as a catalyst. "The pandemic really exposed the weaknesses and the strengths of every country’s digital infrastructure, as they were trying to do things like maintaining social distancing and figure out COVID tracing and immunization support, all in the digital space," Opp told me. Organizations like the UNDP saw requests skyrocket from nations seeking help building specific digital tools, like databases for health management and vaccine tracking. For example, in India, the UNDP aided the rapid development of a national COVID […]

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