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Summary

This discussion focused on the role of libraries in the digital age and their potential integration into the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) ecosystem. The conversation was led by representatives from Library Aid Africa, who presented their organization’s efforts to transform libraries into innovative digital hubs. They outlined programs aimed at empowering librarians with digital skills and engaging them in internet governance discussions.

Participants explored strategies for positioning libraries as digital inclusion centers within communities, emphasizing the importance of infrastructure, accessibility, and community engagement. The discussion highlighted the need for libraries to upskill staff, provide digital tools, and collaborate with partners to meet community needs effectively.

The conversation also addressed ways for libraries to engage with the IGF and influence digital policymaking. Suggestions included increasing librarian participation in IGF events, sharing case studies, and leveraging libraries’ unique position as information hubs to contribute to policy discussions.

Sustainability and partnerships were identified as crucial elements for libraries’ digital transformation. Participants proposed collaborations with educational institutions, private companies, and local startups to secure resources and support. The importance of adopting a multi-stakeholder approach and exploring intersections between libraries and various sectors was emphasized.

The discussion concluded by acknowledging the changing media landscape and the need for libraries to adapt their outreach methods to engage youth and diverse communities. Participants stressed the importance of encouraging responsible use of digital tools and highlighted libraries’ potential to bridge digital divides and promote equitable access to information and resources.

Keypoints

Major discussion points:

– Overview of Library Aid Africa’s programs and initiatives to transform libraries into digital hubs

– How libraries can serve as digital inclusion centers in communities

– Ways for libraries to engage with and influence internet governance forums

– Potential partnerships and collaborative models to support libraries’ digital transformation

The overall purpose of the discussion was to explore how libraries in Africa can evolve to become digital hubs and engage more actively in internet governance, while serving their communities’ needs for digital access and skills.

The tone of the discussion was collaborative and forward-looking. Participants shared ideas enthusiastically and built on each other’s comments. There was a sense of optimism about the potential for libraries to play an important role in digital inclusion and internet governance, balanced with pragmatism about the challenges involved. The tone remained consistent throughout, with participants offering constructive suggestions and insights.

Speakers

– DAMILARE OYEDELE: Facilitator/moderator of the discussion

– SHAGUN: Presenter from Library Aid Africa

– SARAH KADDU: Librarian

– GABRIEL KARSAN: Online participant

– MARIA: Participant with expertise in policy and libraries

Additional speakers:

– Unnamed male participant: Works with capacity building for regulators in Sub-Saharan Africa

– Unnamed female participant

Revised Summary: Libraries in the Digital Age and Internet Governance

Introduction:

This discussion, facilitated by Damilare Oyedele, explored the evolving role of libraries in the digital age and their potential integration into the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) ecosystem. The conversation featured insights from Library Aid Africa representatives, librarians, and participants with expertise in policy and capacity building.

Damilare Oyedele opened by introducing Library Aid Africa’s programs, including the African Library and Information Associations and Institutions (AfLIA) Leadership Academy and their digital literacy products. He posed key questions to guide the discussion:

1. How can libraries transform into digital inclusion hubs?

2. How can libraries engage with and influence internet governance forums?

3. What partnerships are needed for libraries’ sustainability and digital transformation?

Libraries as Digital Inclusion Hubs and Their Role in Internet Governance:

The discussion emphasized the transformation of libraries from traditional book repositories to innovative digital hubs. Damilare Oyedele highlighted this shift, describing libraries evolving from “quiet, boring space of books alone to a more innovative environment.” Sarah Kaddu stressed the need for libraries to stock digital tools and upskill staff to manage them effectively. Maria underscored the fundamental requirements of infrastructure and internet access for libraries to serve as digital inclusion centers.

Speakers agreed that libraries must evolve to meet community needs in contextualized ways, not only providing access to digital resources but also actively engaging with communities. Sarah Kaddu suggested that libraries should reach out to communities, inviting and encouraging all categories of people to access and learn to use digital tools.

The importance of libraries engaging with and influencing internet governance forums was highlighted. Damilare Oyedele and Sarah Kaddu agreed that librarians need competence and upskilling to effectively participate in Internet Governance Forums (IGFs). Sarah Kaddu emphasized that libraries should participate in IGFs to understand and relate to their work.

Gabriel Karsan drew a parallel between libraries and internet governance principles, stating, “When we think about the internet and its principles of openness, accessibility, and providing a user the chance to have end-to-end access to resources, it’s the same thing as the abstraction of the library.” This comparison highlighted the shared values of openness and accessibility.

Maria suggested that libraries should use case studies to demonstrate their ecosystem to policymakers, proposing that libraries “use their own case studies at a national level and perhaps bring them into these spaces to talk about these success stories with other policymakers.”

Damilare Oyedele mentioned the African Library Internet Governance Ambassadors Program, which aims to build capacity for librarians to engage in internet governance discussions.

Partnerships and Sustainability for Libraries:

The speakers unanimously agreed on the importance of collaboration and partnerships for libraries’ sustainability and digital transformation. Damilare Oyedele emphasized the significance of collaboration with schools, colleges, and tech companies. Sarah Kaddu advocated for a multi-stakeholder approach to attract funding, stating, “We need to work in a model which is mild stakeholder take on a mild stakeholder approach so that we can contribute… to so many of them health we can come in to contribute education agriculture we don’t have to work alone anymore.”

The discussion also explored the potential for libraries to serve as competence centers for both education and professional upskilling. Maria suggested that libraries should explore intersections with themes like democracy and peacebuilding, broadening their societal impact.

Sarah Kaddu emphasized the importance of encouraging responsible use of digital tools and AI, suggesting that libraries should embrace rather than resist these technologies.

Conclusion:

The discussion concluded with Damilare Oyedele inviting participants to check out Library Aid Africa’s website and scan a QR code for attendance sheets, demonstrating the organization’s own use of digital tools.

DAMILARE OYEDELE: In African countries to be able to navigate The IGF ecosystem. Well, I have us to progress today. I have three speakers joining me online in the person of Sheg who will be walking us through a few pointers that we do at library in Africa and from there You You Okay All right, great so walk you through a couple of things today We’re gonna discuss about what we do as an organization and from they’re gonna dive into the insert about today’s session and from there We’re gonna speak about what’s comes to mind when you hear about the word library and from there We’re gonna dive into the program proper and also question and answer session I’m also gonna give you a guide of today’s consultation and of course that we did a construction program and we dive into Questions remarks and we end the session. So it’s gonna be interactive with our online participants and those that are present with us here today So without further ado, I’m gonna dive in further to invite my colleague Shagun to guide with the presentation Shagun about you

SHAGUN: Thank You Damilare So, good day, everyone, and it’s nice to have you join us. So, I’ll be taking us through what we do as an organization and who we are. Thank you. So, let’s move on. Thank you, Damle. Next slide, please. All right. So, at Library Aid Africa, we collaborate with partners using – we use digital transformative tools and also community engagement to see how we can make and transform libraries to be a viable space. Can we move to the next slide? Now, based on what we’ve done so far as an organization, within the space of five years of establishment, we’ve been able to work with partners across nine African countries, and we’ve also been able to make impact that cross across 22 African countries. And most of our impact, we’re going to be sharing it with you, and you’ll get to know more about what we’ve done. Now, some of the impact, just as I mentioned earlier on, we have that of the Young African Library Leader Fellowship, and we also have another of our programs, that is the Community Library Center, and we also have another program that is the Library Selfie Series, and we also have the Mini Library Project. All those programs, we do them to see how we can make libraries a viable space. Like that of the YALF, most of the participants went as far as carrying out projects. So what we do in YALF is we train young library leaders and then using digital tools. And at the end of the day, they try to carry out a capstone. And that capstone is within their local communities where they can be able to make impact. And from what we’ve been able to done, we started YALF like four years ago. And within that space of four years, we’ve been able to train about a hundred participants, young library leaders, and then also those leaders caught across 19 African countries. And at the end of the day, about 50 and more have carried out capstone that have really been a positive impact to their communities. They’ve been able to do capstones that was able to make their libraries viable and their community. So we’re going to listen to some of the testimonies of those participants as we hear how they benefited from the programs we put them through.

DAMILARE OYEDELE: So the video will be played very soon, just a few seconds to play the video. Thank you.

SHAGUN: Sorry for the delay. The video will soon play. It’s just a short one minutes or so video just to show testimonies of YALF participants that have benefited. They did a lot of projects that turns out to be very impactful to their communities in terms of building their libraries around their communities, equipping those libraries, and these are as a result of-

DAMILARE OYEDELE: Can you check when the video is playing already, please? I’m sorry.

SHAGUN: All right. For those of us online, we can’t really see the video from our end.

DAMILARE OYEDELE: Yeah, apologies for that, but we have to progress. The next part of the agenda, so you can go ahead with your presentation, Shagun.

SHAGUN: Okay. All right, so based on the programs that we have, we develop and are currently working on some products that can help us seamlessly carry out those programs and also make library viable space. One of the products we’re currently working on is a platform for YARV, and the platform is to see how we can upskill young library leaders from that platform. Then we also have other platforms and products that we are working on, and one of the, sorry about that. So yeah, this is, yeah, one of the products is a library tracker. Sorry, can you still move back? Library tracker is next after YARV. Yeah, library tracker. So library tracker, with library tracker, what the product does is how it tries to connect library users to library, where they can be able to find libraries around them, they can be able to view resources about the library, and not just that, the good part is also they can borrow books from those library using that app that we’re currently working on. And also one of our product we’re also working on is the library XAfrica. And what it is doing is equipping and upskilling librarians with digital skills to be able to transform them beyond just the normal bookkeeping, to also see how they can put up technical skills into the library ecosystem. Also another product we’re also working on is the library volunteer core, and what this product seeks to do is to see how it can connect as many digital talents we have out there with libraries, such that they can be able to volunteer their talents to see how they can improve on. the libraries, and then also doing so, those volunteers will also get to improve on their experience while at the same time servicing those libraries. And then also, these are some of the programs that we have currently running, one of which is the Library Policy Fellowship, which is geared toward empowering librarians with the knowledge they need to have to be able to influence and also change library policies and also legislation around the ecosystem. And also, we have the Library Internet Governance Ambassadors Program, which you will get to know more about, which is part of why we’re here today. And then also, we also have another program, which is the Community Library Center Project, and that is geared towards setting up libraries in our local communities and seeing how we can make those communities a hub that have access to learning resources. So these are just some of the programs that we have, and these are some of the things you need to know about Library Aid Africa. Thank you. I believe you’ve been able to have an overview of what we do in Library Aid Africa. Thank you so much. Damilare, over to you.

DAMILARE OYEDELE: Thank you so much, Shagun, for that presentation. Diving in further into what we’ll be doing today, into this conversation, is for us to understand that we can work with libraries much more better to understand the legislative process and IGF governance ecosystem as a whole. We’re going to inquire today, inquire about what libraries can do to be part of the IGF ecosystem, how libraries are essential partners to address digital public goods, and how libraries are key partners towards achieving digital features in African countries. And of course, also going to like dive into to hide this about what can libraries do better? What can we do? How can we improve on things? What do we should we collaborate with, and how can we upscale our working library ecosystem as we progress? But however, I have a question for you. What comes to mind when you have the word libraries? Anybody think, what comes to mind when you hear the word libraries? A lot of books. Okay, you’re correct. You? Books? Okay. Okay. All right. I mean, we have different responses as regards to what comes to mind when you hear the word libraries. And I can see, let me show the chat box to see if we have a response in the chat box from an online participant. What comes to mind when you hear the word library? All right. You’re all correct. However, libraries, over time, are transforming from the quiet, boring space of books alone to a more innovative environment, right? And that’s why empowering librarians’ digital skills is important to upskill themselves to be able to make libraries much more vibrant and innovative ecosystem. Okay. And diving further into this conversation, we’ll be presenting to you proper what the program is all about, African Library Internet Governance Ambassadors Program, and what do we aim to achieve with it. So what are we doing as a program on this particular intervention? We’re working towards empowering library leaders in Africa to integrate libraries into the discourse and actions of the IGF. The national level is ensuring that active participation across board is guaranteed, and also to ensure that we’re able to shape internet governance policies and advance data inclusion strategies for libraries in African countries. And why are we doing this? We are doing this to specifically address the capacity gap among librarians, to engage meaningfully in the internet governance ecosystem, and also to contribute towards shaping policies around data inclusion for libraries. So what approach are we deploying to achieve this particular intervention that we’re working on currently? Number one, we’ll be working on an annual ambassadors program where we get to engage and train librarians to build practical skills and knowledge about the internet governance ecosystem, and collaborate with existing IGFs. IGF and ICANN ambassadors in various countries. And the second approach here that we’ll be deploying is to explore collaborative engagement in the context of to initiate and build collaboration between libraries and IGF ecosystem in African countries at a national and regional levels across board. And also it’s around community building. So we need a vibrant community of librarians, independent governors, ecosystem partners to leverage expertise and network activities and programs that will drive value for impact of library engagement at the IGF level in Africa. And what do we aim to achieve with this? Are we looking at building a very vibrant team of librarians across African countries, fostering collaboration between libraries and the IGF ecosystem partners, leading an increased representation of libraries in the IGF discussions. The second point that we’re trying to achieve is to enhance ability to advocate and lead engagement activities with libraries resulting to more improvement of libraries at a country level of the IGFs. And to increase awareness of libraries importance in the IGF ecosystem and this time mission efforts through evidence-based activities in collaboration with IGF partners in various countries in Africa. So that’s an overview of the program. I don’t know if you have questions that you’d love to ask online and offline that you need further courtesy on this particular part of the presentation. Questions, comments? Okay, please pass me the mic. Thank you very much. Thank you for the presentation. Interesting topic, I have not thought much about this. I’m working with the capacity building for regulators in South Sahara Africa. So I assume the library you are talking about is kind of a hub for information or something in a virtual or physical space where I assume connectivity is a presumption, some kind of processing going on and some structure. So can you say anything on what is the realities on the hubs that you have described in your project? Where are the libraries today and what would you like them to be? If you can say something on that. Sure, thank you so much for your question. And I would say that libraries are transforming from the boring quiet space to a more innovative environment. And access to internet is very- in that particular ecosystem for libraries to transform to digital hubs, I want them to be. For instance, if a library in a community has internet connectivity, the community gets to benefit from digital goods and capacity that the library has to provide digital access to them. So libraries are not just access to book selling, but libraries are transforming to access points, opportunities, digital tech hubs and environments for people to thrive, to create ideas and innovation. The reason why this particular program is important for us to see that how are libraries able to scale from what we know what we know them to be to what we really are currently. Libraries have moved from the book space alone to a more innovative environment that thrives and supports innovation. Great. Any further questions? So all participants, please feel free to drop your question in the chat box as we progress. All right, great. So it appears there are no further questions, and I’m going to dive in further to our conversation for today, which we’ll be discussing about. Okay, so for the next 20 minutes, we’re going to have a couple of exercises to do both online and offline, and we’ll be conversing together to respond to some very key questions around based on the program we presented to you earlier just now. What can we do to make this a more content approach to do? And we have three themed questions that we have for you to respond to, but the questions will be interactive. So you get to come back together, share ideas on how that can be better, and document your thoughts and share with us. All right, so we have three questions here. The three questions here has been designed to help us to work together much more with the IGF ecosystem and create ideas. The three questions are across three major categories. Category number one is around digital inclusion in libraries, and the question is that how can libraries be better positioned to serve as digital inclusion hubs within their communities, and what strategies can ensure equitable access to digital resources? And the second part of the question goes to around, you know, integration into the IGF, right? And the question is that what innovative approaches can libraries adopt to effectively engage with internet governance forum and influence digital policymaking at local, national, and regional levels. And the last part of the question goes around sustainability and partnerships. In the context of what collaborative models or partnership can libraries leverage to secure resources and support sustainable digital transformation? So these are the questions we have. But I see there’s a small crowd in person, so I think we can interact with these questions and share our ideas. So we have 20 minutes to discuss these things. So on the first question, for those in the room and those online also, how can libraries be better positioned to serve as digital inclusion hubs within their communities? And what strategies can ensure equitable access to digital resources and tools? It could be ideas from your work experience on how what you’ve seen in other ecosystems and how libraries can potentially align towards those priorities. Please feel free to speak. OK, thank you. Availability. I mean, to be able to have access. I assume that’s one factor, probably others as well. Availability and access. Yeah, availability. To be able to have access to these hubs, even though if they are virtual or if they are physical. So I assume there’s a low threshold to enter. So I assume to be aware of and also have the resources to really have the low barrier to access. I would say that was one contribution. Great, insightful. You want to go ahead? Especially nothing from my side. It’s OK. He’s told it’s a good point. And I have nothing to say. Awesome.

SARAH KADDU: OK, thank you so much, Damilare. I think how the libraries can be better positioned to serve as digital inclusion, especially if I look at our communities that are underserved. First of all, the libraries need to stock the tools and also upskill themselves to be well conversant with management of these tools and then work with the communities, reach out to the communities and not only to wait for the people to come to them, but also go to the communities, invite, encourage all categories of people to come and access these tools and maybe also train them, upskill them and be able to meet their needs. Because if they are not able to meet their needs, then they’re going to work in isolation. and the communities will not see these libraries as something important or a space that will be important for them to visit and access. And maybe the strategy is that they need to work with other partners within the ecosystem and the infosphere so that they are able to know what exactly is offered by others so that they come in to assist.

DAMILARE OYEDELE: Interestingly, you mentioned availability and access and you emphasized more community and game and integration, right? Brilliant. Well, yeah, I think I would also complement the idea of Sarah, but also of what he mentioned about the first step for me would be the infrastructure. So really know if the libraries can have access to the internet, what kind of access do they have, but also about perhaps to operate in a more contextualized way to make sure that they understand the needs of their communities because they can vary also, it can be quite different. But I also found very interesting what you mentioned about the library tracker so that libraries can connect to each other. I found that a great solution also. So perhaps some libraries who have less resources or less access know that there’s other libraries around in the region that they can also rely on and perhaps even complement the resources they have or yeah, some questions and challenges. Interestingly, I mean, our pointers are interconnected, availability and access, community and infrastructure. First of all, these are essential components to bring together to make libraries thrive digitally. All right, diving to the next point of the conversation here which is about integration into internet governance. And the question here specifically aligns towards what innovative approaches can libraries adopt to effectively engage with internet governance forum and influence digital policy as local national journalists? Is it a more technical question? Sure, go ahead. Yes, thank you. The question is not obvious for me. Well, probably because I don’t know enough of the IDF’s different forums but I assume it has to be, the possibility to advance the usage but in the same time you have to have as was underscored previously, the competence, capacity, ability to be able to integrate and assuming then that you have access and connectivity and that is stable and also that the places are secure. I mean, you showed Abuja, I mean, it is, I mean, Nigeria is maybe the case point. So that these are secure spaces where you can really get into this. And I assume there could then be ambassadors for usage to advance how do you step on to the digital transformation basically where the internet is a tool for doing. I mean, education, training, upskilling, other things. That means that the Internet becomes an integrated part of the library as an information hub. Maybe that is a way for integrating. But as I said, I don’t know enough about Internet de forums, but I assume competence, upskilling, and also making the point of advancing the usage could be maybe one avenue, but there are probably others. Great. Thank you so much for that comment. Yeah. Interesting point you mentioned about competence, upskilling, and that’s why this program we have is important for us to be able to empower librarians in African countries to understand how to engage in Internet governance ecosystem. And a few points we try to work on here is to make sure that we are able to train librarians on what Internet governance is all about and engage them with local IGFs in diverse communities and engage in conversations and to prioritize library connectivity in their societies. And through those kind of dialogues and conversations, we see a more collaborative effort to drive capacity, competence, like you mentioned, and also lead to these libraries being more information hubs that are much more vibrant, leveraging technology. Thank you so much for that. Madam Sarah, do you have any comments to add on that?

SARAH KADDU: Thank you so much. I think to begin with, librarians, libraries need to know that they are not almost mentioned in the IGF. So to begin with, they should start by participating in the IGF and see what goes on in the IGF so that they can relate with their work and then be able to innovatively practice and deliver services that speak to what IGF is talking about and also be able to participate in policymaking activities at national and regional levels.

DAMILARE OYEDELE: Thank you so much for that comment. Before I go to you, Maria, we have a hand up online. Gabriel Karsan. Over to you. Gabriel, are you able to unmute yourself to speak? Excuse me. Someone’s going to want to speak online. Gabriel wants to speak online.

GABRIEL KARSAN: Thank you, Damilare. I hope I am audible. Sure, go ahead. Great. First of all, quite an interesting conversation. I just wanted to jump in and share a little bit of context on how we could integrate internet governance and the library community. When we think about the internet and its principles of openness, accessibility, and providing a user the chance to have end-to-end access to resources, it’s the same thing as the abstraction of the library, because the library is an open center where records from different sources all over the world build on diversity and inclusion for the purpose of preserving knowledge, but also making information more utilized and also accessible without any barrier. So these things already go hand-in-hand as we see today’s synergy. When we go back to think about how the internet in itself got built, it was a lot of the academic departments or academia that had a lot of library initiation in collecting the data, but also processing the data and preserving them so that the next generation could take on and build. And I think this is the case that we have now. So I think the program of having librarians and internet governors equipped together is first a reminder of the role of academia, but also the role of librarians as the safe guardians of a collective, not just physical, but also virtual space of preservation of knowledge, but also history and integration of diversity, because they still stand with the same principles of openness, centralization, but end-to-end delivery of resources. So the first thing we could do is jump on the case of literacy, because the internet is just a technology, it is a medium. Now, a library can be anything, a library of code, a library of books, a library of different intellectual property. And when you think of it, the source code, a human being is the original library, because you store particular forms of information within yourself. But now the internet has established an infrastructure where we could store information, preserve, and make it utilized to each and every one of us. But when it is based on the principles of a library, community-driven, and always accessible, as most of the speakers have mentioned, this will be something that can push for further integration within our purpose. Thank you.

DAMILARE OYEDELE: Thank you so much for those insightful comments there, Dr. Sen. And I should mention that the internet itself is a combination of a lot of libraries on the internet. And librarians, of course, I would say, play a very vital role in creating the internet itself. We have the records and information from ages that were all uploaded online. And I hope that through this conversation we’re having now, we’re able to see more and more librarians on board to contribute meaningfully and actively to the internet governance ecosystem. Opomaria, do you have any pointers you want to add on this particular question?

MARIA: Yeah, just a quick point. Well, I think everyone already mentioned more or less everything. But perhaps another thing that I would add that I think it’s also important is something that I think it is also important that maybe policymakers understand how libraries’ ecosystem operates at a national level. Because usually it’s quite unique, very contextual. It also depends on the country. It can be very different. So I think it’s something that I also observed that can be interesting is that libraries use their own case studies at a national level and perhaps bring them into these spaces to talk about these success stories with other policymakers. And also so that they can have a better understanding on how the library ecosystem is perhaps built in a certain country and how can they collaborate with them for their projects.

DAMILARE OYEDELE: Interesting point that you mentioned about storytelling and communicating impacts. And that shows the importance of upscale librarians on how to document the impacts, communicate advocacy, and engage with the wider society, interestingly. And the last point that we have here is around sustainability and partnerships, right? And this is very important because libraries can’t do it alone. We need to work with other partners. partners, collaborators, or ecosystem partners to see how can we cross-pollinate ideas and innovation, right? And what collaborative models or partnership can libraries leverage to secure resources and support sustainable data transformation initiatives in the societies? Munagop is quiet. Thank you. It’s a very good initiative. I’m seeing the full session. So I’m just to find out some points for this particular section only because I’m working types of that we are working on digital literacy. So library, you can collaborate schools and college levels. So there can be students can be learned many things from the library. Next part is the public private company, then they will be support this program. And in technologies company, also more than I major things is a local startup companies, they can be developed this initiative and grow up. That’s all that’s all from my side. Sure. Thank you so much for that. From your point is you spoke about a lot about public private partnerships and how libraries can engage key partners in the private sector, technology company partners, NGOs, NGOs, and other partners to see how we can prosper in this innovation, not just we didn’t say number and getting these partners to scale impact and spread the word out there of what our roles are. Thank you so much. Going forward on that. Any comments you want to add to that question? What collaborative models or partnership can libraries leverage to secure resources and support for sustainable digital transformation initiatives? For those online, if you’re willing to speak, kindly raise your hands, or you can drop your responses in the chat box, and I’m able to read on your behalf over here. Sure. I think maybe it could be on the education sector or it’s training. So it’s a combination both on school side, and other will be on the professional side. I mean, work-related upskilling to use the libraries as a hub or central for competence center if that could be possible so both going school side and then the other professional companies public institutions other that would like to see the advancement and particularly talking about digital transformation number of skills would be soft skills of various kinds will be so that’s two possibilities interesting thank you so much but I’m Sarah thank

SARAH KADDU: you so much personally I think there is a lot to offer but we can’t over it as people from the library sector so we need to work in a model which is mild stakeholder take on a mild stakeholder approach so that we can contribute I know we can contribute to so many of them health we can come in to contribute education agriculture we don’t have to work alone anymore but we have to work as a mild stakeholder group to be able to attract funding to be able to win resources and then be able to take on the sustainability part of it and also the digital transformation that you want to see great points Maria yeah just a

MARIA: final point I think I would also well adding up to what Sarah said I would also say perhaps also a model could be for libraries to dare to venture a bit beyond the library and information not necessarily feel but ecosystem also because libraries in the latest years they also engage in a lot of different themes they engage a lot in democracy related themes peace building support of digital skills like you said so I also perhaps think it is also interesting to explore these intersections that libraries have and see if there is an opportunity to engage with the stakeholders that libraries are sometimes not used to engaging with in these spaces thank you

DAMILARE OYEDELE: an emphasis on intersection of our work in the library space in terms of our work related to health, education, no poverty, zero hunger, connecting those dots to engage and speak the language that this partner has to understand. Great. Thank you so much for your insights, for your responses. My colleagues are documenting these thoughts you shared with us, and that will further inform our decision going forward on how we shape things forward on this possible intervention. And going forward on today’s charts, we’d love to hear from you in terms of ideas, thoughts you have in your mind you want to share that we have not mentioned in this conversation today, that you think will be worth exploring for libraries as we progress, to be much more digital savvy, and for that build strong capacity of librarians and also librarians to be able to engage in digital economic opportunities, and not just that, how libraries can be best positioned as a hub for digital empowerment. So if there are comments or general remarks you have that you have not captured, that you think will be essential for us to capture as we progress in this conversation, and afterwards for implementation, please quiet down and speak about those. Sure. I’m just thinking of how do you reach, how do you reach the youth or the people, your customers, or you say your clients, the public. I assume that’s an issue that could be challenging depending upon context, social setting, and capacity. So I assume access will be how do you reach out basically, and also in the media landscape, changing with different formats, shorter communication from youth, etc. So the ability to reach various information channels, to reach and get positive development for this. But otherwise, very interesting to hear this, because this was not something that I’ve been thinking so much about, but makes a lot of sense. Very good job you’re doing. Thank you so much for your comments. I will take that into consideration as we progress.

SARAH KADDU: Thank you so much, Demilare. I found your presentation quite interesting. anything. I can say that from a librarian perspective, I think we are not going to fight the digital tools, we are not going to fight AI, but rather we work to ensure that we encourage everyone to use these tools responsibly, to use these tools maybe in governance, information access. We can also navigate this space in an ethical way so that we can benefit from the benefits that they come along with. Otherwise, if you want to fight the digital tools, we are likely to lose the war. We cannot afford anymore to do that. And also, we start from our youth, the kids at home. We should encourage them to use the digital tools rather than telling them how bad they are, but just question them, that use them responsibly, meaningfully, engage in this space because you want ABCD and don’t engage in this space because of ABC, so that they are able to benefit. Otherwise, we are going to be left behind and yet we are already saying no one should be left behind. And also, to the elderly, we should also tell them how beautiful digital inclusion is in their activities and the communities as well, because if they are farmers, they also need to get the best prices of their crops produced, but if they are not digitally literate, they are not able to find the best prices for their commodities. And also, to the learners, we need to inform them that they can pass well their courseworks, their exams, if they engaged so well in the digital space and do a lot of preparations, seminars, group work, and the like. And then, of course, the traders. they will do the same. I thank you.

DAMILARE OYEDELE: I love how practical you are with your interventions. And these are the comments we’ll be taking notes now. And these are things you’re gonna see how do we integrate this going forward and improve on them as we dive in towards implementing this particular intervention. Yes, Maria.

MARIA: Well, no, not final comments really, just to congratulate you on everything you’re doing. I think it’s really great because you’re doing not just capacity building, but also you’re keeping the field stronger by keeping the libraries interconnected. And yeah, that’s also what makes the field stronger on the long-term. So congratulations on everything.

DAMILARE OYEDELE: Great, thank you so much for the feedbacks, for the interaction and for the conversation. I believe we’ve been able to dive into a couple of things today, which has informed our decision, which will inform our decision going forward, I must say, on some clear pointers on what we want to do. Gabriel Kassan, do you have any comments you wanna add as we end round of this session this afternoon? Gabriel, any comments you wanna heard?

GABRIEL KARSAN: Yes, I hope I’m audible.

DAMILARE OYEDELE: Sure, you’re audible, we can hear you.

GABRIEL KARSAN: First of all, congratulations. And I think we have received quite insightful comments that still are pivotal in how we move forward in the agency of having more inclusion, more openness and the ability of access, but access in a very localized manner. And when we think about libraries, and when we think about libraries, libraries are birthed from the matter of community. And I think we can build the community from there and using the internet now, which is a collective of digital intelligence with the emerging technologies, it’s quite pivotal where we have the principles of libraries to connect to the internet as how we evolve and progress to make it more equitable and interoperable that every person can have access to intelligence, information to further their own lives. So I think this will build a lot of cohesion in our policy element where the policymakers could also understand and also a good marriage. to the tech community and the whole multi-stakeholder approach, especially now when we are at the IGF. So those are my few comments and I’m looking forward to how we unravel. And thank you all for the insightful comments.

DAMILARE OYEDELE: Great, thank you so much for your comments. Please kindly QR code for the attendance sheets. We’re going to connect with you to share the reports of this conversation and to show the progress you make as an organization. We appreciate your time and the conversation we’ve had today. And kindly check out our website to learn more about what we do as an organization. And we’re happy to connect with you further to see how we can collaborate, how we can cross-pollinate ideas, how we can engage more with other stakeholders to make libraries a more vibrant ecosystem that caters for all aspects of our lives. On that note, thank you so much for your time. I appreciate your commitment and the conversation. And we engage with you further as the conference goes by. Do enjoy the rest of the afternoon. Thank you so much and bye for now. We’re done. No, no, no, it’s just remember, don’t worry. I’m okay. I don’t have BS, so don’t worry. I don’t have anything to drag. Okay, so I need to… It’s going to break in a minute. We’re going to have to do a little bit of a the the the the the the the the the the the the the . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Agreement Points

Libraries need to transform into digital inclusion hubs

speakers

DAMILARE OYEDELE

SARAH KADDU

MARIA

arguments

Availability and low-barrier access are key factors

Libraries need to stock digital tools and upskill staff to manage them

Infrastructure and internet access are fundamental requirements

summary

All speakers agree that libraries need to evolve into digital hubs by ensuring availability of digital resources, providing low-barrier access, and developing necessary infrastructure and skills.

Libraries should actively engage with Internet Governance Forums

speakers

DAMILARE OYEDELE

SARAH KADDU

arguments

Librarians need competence and upskilling to engage with Internet Governance Forums

Libraries should participate in IGFs to understand and relate to their work

summary

Both speakers emphasize the importance of librarians participating in and engaging with Internet Governance Forums to better understand and contribute to digital policy discussions.

Collaboration and partnerships are crucial for libraries’ sustainability

speakers

DAMILARE OYEDELE

SARAH KADDU

MARIA

arguments

Collaboration with schools, colleges and tech companies is important

Libraries should take a multi-stakeholder approach to attract funding

Libraries should explore intersections with themes like democracy and peacebuilding

summary

All speakers agree that libraries need to form partnerships and collaborations with various stakeholders to ensure sustainability and expand their impact.

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers view libraries as centers for digital literacy and skills development, emphasizing their role in educating and upskilling community members in the responsible use of digital tools.

speakers

DAMILARE OYEDELE

SARAH KADDU

arguments

Libraries can serve as competence centers for both education and professional upskilling

Libraries should encourage responsible use of digital tools and AI

Unexpected Consensus

Libraries’ role in broader societal issues

speakers

MARIA

GABRIEL KARSAN

arguments

Libraries should explore intersections with themes like democracy and peacebuilding

Libraries can build community and make intelligence more accessible through the internet

explanation

Both speakers unexpectedly agree on libraries’ potential to address broader societal issues beyond traditional roles, suggesting a more expansive and transformative vision for libraries in the digital age.

Overall Assessment

Summary

The speakers generally agree on the need for libraries to transform into digital hubs, engage with Internet governance, form partnerships, and expand their roles in society. There is a strong consensus on the importance of digital inclusion, capacity building, and collaboration.

Consensus level

High level of consensus among speakers, implying a shared vision for the future of libraries in the digital age. This agreement suggests potential for coordinated efforts in transforming libraries and integrating them into the broader digital ecosystem and policy discussions.

Different Viewpoints

Unexpected Differences

Overall Assessment

summary

No significant areas of disagreement were identified among the speakers.

difference_level

The level of disagreement was minimal to nonexistent. The speakers generally agreed with and built upon each other’s points regarding the role of libraries in digital inclusion, internet governance, and sustainable partnerships. This alignment suggests a shared vision for the future of libraries in the digital age, which could facilitate smoother implementation of proposed initiatives.

Partial Agreements

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers view libraries as centers for digital literacy and skills development, emphasizing their role in educating and upskilling community members in the responsible use of digital tools.

speakers

DAMILARE OYEDELE

SARAH KADDU

arguments

Libraries can serve as competence centers for both education and professional upskilling

Libraries should encourage responsible use of digital tools and AI

Key Takeaways

Libraries are transforming from quiet book spaces to innovative digital hubs

Availability, access, and infrastructure are crucial for libraries to serve as digital inclusion centers

Libraries need to upskill staff and stock digital tools to meet community needs

Librarians should actively participate in Internet Governance Forums to shape policies

Multi-stakeholder partnerships are important for libraries to secure resources and support digital transformation

Libraries should encourage responsible use of digital tools and AI rather than resist them

Resolutions and Action Items

Train librarians on Internet governance and engage them with local IGFs

Prioritize library connectivity in communities

Document and communicate library impact stories to policymakers

Explore intersections between libraries and themes like democracy and peacebuilding

Unresolved Issues

Specific strategies for reaching youth and adapting to changing media landscapes

Detailed plans for implementing digital transformation in resource-constrained libraries

Methods to measure success of library integration into Internet governance ecosystem

Suggested Compromises

Balance traditional library services with new digital offerings

Collaborate with both public and private sector partners to leverage diverse resources

Libraries are transforming from the boring quiet space to a more innovative environment. And access to internet is very- in that particular ecosystem for libraries to transform to digital hubs, I want them to be. For instance, if a library in a community has internet connectivity, the community gets to benefit from digital goods and capacity that the library has to provide digital access to them.

speaker

Damilare Oyedele

reason

This comment reframes libraries as digital innovation hubs rather than just repositories of books, highlighting their potential for community impact.

impact

It shifted the conversation to focus on libraries as centers of digital access and innovation, leading to discussion of specific strategies for digital inclusion.

First of all, the libraries need to stock the tools and also upskill themselves to be well conversant with management of these tools and then work with the communities, reach out to the communities and not only to wait for the people to come to them, but also go to the communities, invite, encourage all categories of people to come and access these tools and maybe also train them, upskill them and be able to meet their needs.

speaker

Sarah Kaddu

reason

This comment provides concrete suggestions for how libraries can become digital inclusion hubs, emphasizing proactive community engagement.

impact

It deepened the discussion by moving from abstract concepts to specific actionable strategies libraries can implement.

When we think about the internet and its principles of openness, accessibility, and providing a user the chance to have end-to-end access to resources, it’s the same thing as the abstraction of the library, because the library is an open center where records from different sources all over the world build on diversity and inclusion for the purpose of preserving knowledge, but also making information more utilized and also accessible without any barrier.

speaker

Gabriel Karsan

reason

This comment draws an insightful parallel between the principles of the internet and libraries, highlighting their shared values and goals.

impact

It elevated the conversation by connecting libraries to broader internet governance principles, leading to discussion of how libraries can engage more deeply with internet governance forums.

I think it’s something that I also observed that can be interesting is that libraries use their own case studies at a national level and perhaps bring them into these spaces to talk about these success stories with other policymakers. And also so that they can have a better understanding on how the library ecosystem is perhaps built in a certain country and how can they collaborate with them for their projects.

speaker

Maria

reason

This comment introduces the important idea of libraries sharing their success stories to influence policy and build partnerships.

impact

It shifted the discussion towards practical ways libraries can engage with policymakers and other stakeholders, emphasizing the importance of storytelling and demonstrating impact.

We need to work in a model which is mild stakeholder take on a mild stakeholder approach so that we can contribute I know we can contribute to so many of them health we can come in to contribute education agriculture we don’t have to work alone anymore but we have to work as a mild stakeholder group to be able to attract funding to be able to win resources and then be able to take on the sustainability part of it and also the digital transformation that you want to see

speaker

Sarah Kaddu

reason

This comment emphasizes the importance of multi-stakeholder collaboration for libraries to achieve digital transformation and sustainability.

impact

It broadened the discussion to consider how libraries can engage with diverse sectors and stakeholders to secure resources and support.

Overall Assessment

These key comments shaped the discussion by progressively expanding the vision of libraries from traditional book repositories to digital innovation hubs, community engagement centers, and key players in internet governance. The conversation evolved from identifying the need for digital transformation to exploring specific strategies for implementation, stakeholder engagement, and policy influence. The comments collectively emphasized the importance of proactive community outreach, multi-stakeholder collaboration, and sharing success stories to drive the digital transformation of libraries and increase their impact in the internet governance ecosystem.

What are the realities of the library hubs described in the project? Where are the libraries today and what would you like them to be?

speaker

Unnamed participant

explanation

This question seeks to understand the current state of libraries and the vision for their future role, which is important for contextualizing the project’s goals and challenges.

How can libraries ensure availability and low-barrier access to digital resources?

speaker

Unnamed participant

explanation

This area of inquiry is crucial for understanding how to make libraries effective digital inclusion hubs within communities.

How can libraries work with communities to meet their specific needs?

speaker

Sarah Kaddu

explanation

This question addresses the importance of tailoring library services to community requirements, which is essential for their relevance and effectiveness.

How can libraries collaborate with other partners within the ecosystem and infosphere?

speaker

Sarah Kaddu

explanation

This area of research is important for understanding how libraries can integrate with and complement other information services.

What kind of internet access do libraries have, and how can it be improved?

speaker

Maria

explanation

This question is crucial for addressing the infrastructure needs of libraries to function as digital hubs.

How can libraries operate in a more contextualized way to understand the needs of their communities?

speaker

Maria

explanation

This area of inquiry is important for ensuring that library services are relevant and effective for their specific user base.

How can libraries become secure spaces for digital access and learning?

speaker

Unnamed participant

explanation

This question addresses an important aspect of making libraries viable and trusted digital hubs in their communities.

How can libraries effectively participate in and contribute to Internet Governance Forum discussions?

speaker

Sarah Kaddu

explanation

This area of research is crucial for increasing library representation and influence in internet governance.

How can policymakers better understand the library ecosystem at a national level?

speaker

Maria

explanation

This question is important for fostering collaboration between libraries and policymakers in digital governance.

What public-private partnerships can libraries engage in to scale impact?

speaker

Unnamed participant

explanation

This area of inquiry is crucial for identifying sustainable models for library digital transformation.

How can libraries effectively reach out to youth and adapt to changing media landscapes?

speaker

Unnamed participant

explanation

This question addresses the challenge of keeping libraries relevant and accessible to younger generations.

How can libraries encourage responsible use of digital tools and AI across different age groups?

speaker

Sarah Kaddu

explanation

This area of research is important for promoting digital literacy and ethical use of technology through libraries.

Summary

This discussion focused on the impact of artificial intelligence (AI) on education and the challenges and opportunities it presents. Participants, including policymakers, educators, and youth representatives, explored various aspects of AI in education.

Key points included the need for ethical and trustworthy AI systems, addressing the digital divide, and ensuring equitable access to AI-powered educational tools. Speakers emphasized the importance of involving youth in decision-making processes and policy development related to AI in education. The discussion highlighted concerns about data privacy, algorithm bias, and the potential for AI to exacerbate existing inequalities.

Several speakers stressed the need for global collaboration to develop shared standards and best practices for AI in education. The importance of cultural diversity and localized content in AI-powered educational tools was also emphasized. Participants discussed the role of educators in implementing AI systems and the need for proper training to use these tools effectively.

The discussion touched on the challenges of AI-generated content and its impact on academic integrity. Speakers also addressed the potential of AI to personalize learning experiences and improve accessibility for students with diverse needs. The need for critical thinking skills and digital literacy in the age of AI was emphasized.

Overall, the discussion underscored the complex nature of integrating AI into education systems and the need for a multi-stakeholder approach to address challenges and harness opportunities. The importance of balancing innovation with ethical considerations and human-centered design in AI development for education was a recurring theme throughout the discussion.

Keypoints

Major discussion points:

– The impact of AI on education, including opportunities and challenges

– Ethical considerations and accountability for AI in educational settings

– The digital divide and ensuring equitable access to AI-powered education

– The role of youth voices and participation in shaping AI policies for education

– Addressing biases and ensuring diversity in AI development and implementation

Overall purpose/goal:

The discussion aimed to explore the implications of AI for education from multiple stakeholder perspectives, with a focus on including youth voices and considering both opportunities and challenges. The goal was to identify key issues and potential ways forward for responsibly integrating AI into educational systems.

Tone:

The tone was largely constructive and collaborative, with speakers building on each other’s points. There was a sense of urgency around addressing challenges, balanced with optimism about AI’s potential benefits. The tone shifted slightly towards the end to become more action-oriented, with calls for youth to propose solutions rather than just raising problems.

Speakers

– Li Junhua: UN Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs

– Ihita Gangavarapu: Coordinator of India Youth IGF, co-moderator for onsite participants

– Ahmad Khan: Researcher and Development Engineer, Aramco, Saudi Arabia

– Henri Verdier: Ambassador for Digital Affairs, Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs, Government of France

– Margaret Nyambura Ndung’u: Minister at the Ministry of Information, Communication, and Digital Economy, Government of Kenya

– Carol Roach: Moderator

– Phyo Thiri Lwin: Active in regional youth initiatives from Myanmar

– Amal El Fallah Seghrouchni: Minister of Digital Transition and Administration Reform of Morocco

– Umut Pajaro Velasquez: Coordinator of Youth LAC IGF and Youth IGF Colombia

Additional speakers:

– Jarrel James: Researcher for internet resiliency

– Lily Edinam Botsyoe: PhD researcher in privacy

– Ahmad Karim: From Year in Women

– Osei Keja: Representative from African Youth IGF

– Dana Cramer: PhD candidate, Youth IGF Canada

– Asfirna Alduri: Part of the Responsible Technology Hub

Expanded Summary of AI in Education Discussion

Introduction

This discussion explored the impact of artificial intelligence (AI) on education, examining both challenges and opportunities. The panel included policymakers, educators, youth representatives, and researchers from various countries, offering diverse perspectives on this complex topic.

Key Themes and Discussion Points

1. Historical Context and Current AI Applications in Education

Amal El Fallah Seghrouchni provided historical context, noting that AI-assisted teaching began 40 years ago. Li Junhua shared specific examples of AI use in education across different countries, such as AI-powered teaching assistants in China and personalized learning platforms in the United States.

2. AI’s Impact on Education

Speakers discussed AI’s potential to enhance and personalize education. Phyo Thiri Lwin highlighted AI tools’ ability to help non-native speakers improve language skills. Amal El Fallah Seghrouchni emphasized the importance of voice in generative AI for education, especially in multilingual contexts.

Ahmad Khan categorized AI developments in education into two approaches: instructor-focused (instructionist) and student-focused (constructionist). This distinction helped frame the discussion on AI’s varied applications in educational settings.

3. Ethical Considerations and Accountability

There was broad consensus on the need for ethical considerations and accountability in AI education. Amal El Fallah Seghrouchni stressed the importance of transparency and fairness in AI systems making educational decisions, as well as protecting data privacy and cognitive rights.

Umut Pajaro Velasquez argued for shared accountability among multiple stakeholders, including developers, educators, policymakers, and students. The discussion also touched on the ethical implications of using AI tools for academic work, with panelists and audience members debating the boundaries of acceptable AI assistance in education.

4. Addressing Biases and Inequalities

The discussion revealed significant concerns about biases and inequalities in AI education. Li Junhua pointed out the digital divide, noting that less than a third of the global population is connected to the internet. Ahmad Karim highlighted the disparity between the global south, which faces threats and protection concerns regarding AI, and the global north, which tends to focus on opportunities.

Phyo Thiri Lwin elaborated on the challenges of accessing AI education in developing countries, such as infrastructure and funding issues. Asfirna Alduri brought attention to the often-overlooked issue of underprivileged workers, often from the global south, who label AI training data and are frequently excluded from discussions about AI development.

5. Youth Participation in AI Governance and Development

There was strong agreement on the importance of youth involvement in shaping AI policies and implementation in education. Henri Verdier emphasized the need to engage youth in shaping AI policies. Osei Keja advocated for youth involvement in policy-making and governance of AI at regional and national levels.

Asfirna Alduri proposed creating intergenerational spaces where youth can develop AI solutions. An audience member suggested that youth should propose solutions to AI challenges rather than just asking older generations to fix problems, indicating a slight difference in approach to youth involvement.

6. Role of Policymakers and Public Infrastructure

Margaret Nyambura Ndung’u highlighted the role of policymakers in ensuring AI becomes a force multiplier for inclusive and equitable education, addressing the digital divide, and safeguarding equity. Henri Verdier stressed the need for a public infrastructure for educational AI to ensure accessibility and fairness.

7. Concerns and Future Considerations

Ahmad Khan raised concerns about the potential for AI to replace human thinking and creativity. The discussion also touched on the need to validate the accuracy of AI-generated information, especially in STEM fields.

Umut Pajaro Velasquez emphasized the role of academia in researching the impact of AI on education. An audience member suggested the need for universal guidelines on AI use in education.

Conclusion

The discussion underscored the complex nature of integrating AI into education systems and the need for a multi-stakeholder approach to address challenges and harness opportunities. While there was general optimism about AI’s potential to enhance education, speakers emphasized the importance of balancing innovation with ethical considerations, addressing inequalities, and ensuring meaningful youth participation in shaping the future of AI in education.

Moving forward, it is clear that continued international collaboration, inclusive governance structures, and a focus on ethical, user-centric AI development will be crucial in realizing the potential of AI to positively transform education while mitigating associated risks. The historical context provided a valuable perspective on the evolution of AI in education, while the focus on current applications and future challenges highlighted the dynamic nature of this field.

Li Junhua: It’s very heartening to see that the decision makers collaborating with all of you and recognizing the critical role of the young people in shaping these discussions. I’m very or I’m truly inspired by the remarkable leadership and the spirit of the cooperation that you have demonstrated through the IGF youth track over the past months. It has facilitated the individual at a very invaluable cross regional dialogue and learning along the set of a global youth track or the global youth summit. The youth track that sends a very powerful message to the world, namely, uniting across the generations is essential. So only together can we meaningfully address the issues of reshaping the foundation for our future. As we come together today to discuss the impact of the AI that on education, that does remember that, first and foremost, education is one of the fundamental human rights enshrined in the universal declaration. It is our shared responsibility to ensure that the AI supports this right, this fundamental right throughout the world, rather than undermine it. They are a number of the good examples around us. For instance, in Morocco, AI is helping to reduce learning disparities in rural areas. In France, AI is helping virtually impaired students to read the converting digital information into haptic feedback. And in Brazil, AI powered the natural language processing is improving the literacy. Also in India, AI driven voice assisted education tools are fostering language inclusiveness. And in UK, AI is being used to convert the complex documents into sentences using trigonometry. After and concludes some key facts of the opening lecture, we are scheduled during our online conference to have a dedicated discussion and a virtual 있는데 during the week. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, andTwitter.com, Facebook.com. You can also. Well, I’ll keep sharing more data rather than talking quite a lot into easy-to-read formats in over 70 languages, which actually enhanced accessibility for learners with diverse needs. Having said that, we have to recognize that there’s a digital divide at Hamburg’s. That actually hampers the potential of the artists to build on all those good practices. And one very striving figure, less a third of the global population is not connected to the internet, not to mention the AI accessibility. So in this connection, United Nations has been given a strong mandate to right this wrong. The recent adopted Global Digital Compact calls for actions to force the international partnerships that build AI capacity through the education and training to expand access to open AI models, systems, and the training data. So today’s summit provides a platform for multistakeholders intergenerational dialogue on AI, especially on AI training, AI education. I believe your summit, your discussion will greatly help identifying a path towards an ethical digital future where we leverage AI to help guarantee that every individual has an open access to quality education regardless of their backgrounds. So I look forward to hearing from you more with your very brief ideas and innovative actions. Thank you. Thank you very much.

Ihita Gangavarapu: Thank you, Mr. Lee. I know he’s been one of the busiest at this conference and we appreciate the support towards young people in the internet governance space. With this, I think I’ll take over from Ms. Carroll. I am Ayita Gangavarpu. I’m the coordinator of India Youth IGF and also the co-moderator for onsite participants. But before I begin, I would also like to introduce our online moderators. We have Ms. Ines Hafid from the Tunisia IGF and Arab IGF, as well as Mr. Keith Andre from Kenya IGF and the African Youth IGF. This is to ensure that we have a seamless communication and participation, both virtually as well as onsite. All right, with this, we now move on to a very interesting intergenerational panel and it gives me immense pleasure to introduce you to our panelists for today’s session. We have Mr. Andre Verdier, the Ambassador for Digital Affairs, Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs, Government of France. We’re also joined by Ms. Margaret Nyambura Ndugu, Minister at the Ministry of Information, Communication, and Digital Economy, Government of Kenya. We have Ms. Amal El-Falah Segroshni, the Minister of Digital Transition and Administration Reform of Morocco. We have Ms. Fio Thirimin, who is the Coordinator of Youth Myanmar IGF. We have Mr. Ahmed Khan, Researcher and Development Engineer, Aramco, Saudi Arabia. We have Mr. Umut Pajaro Velasquez, the Coordinator of Youth LAC IGF and Youth IGF Colombia, among other affiliations. We have Mr. Khalid Hadadi, who’s the Director of Public Policy, Robolox. With this, now I move on to the very first question, which is directed to our host, Mr. Ahmed Khan. Let us start from the host country. So what is your experience on how AI’s innovation is impacting education? What are the different countries in the world who are adapting AI in education? And what are the different opportunities that this space brings to all of us?

Ahmad Khan: Okay, thank you very much. Actually, the thought came to my mind whether I should use ChatGPT to help me with this remark. I mean, on the one hand, it would improve my output. On the other hand, it could dilute my thoughts and perspective that I’ll share. I think this is the dilemma we face with AI, right? And I’ll get back to this point, but I’d like to touch on some points that answer this topic, and we can expand more in the Q&A as there is interest. So in terms of innovations in AI, there are generally two categories of AI developments in education. The first one is educator-focused or instructor-focused technologies, and these are called the instructionist approaches, which are focused on supporting the automating grading in procedures and feedback on students, for example. And the other approach is called the constructionist approach. And the focus is on how students and learners can use technology to construct knowledge themselves. And that’s more of a hands-on approach to education. And both really provide value and should be involved in how we go about integrating AI technologies into education. In terms of concerns, there are concerns with data use by technology companies, there are concerns with decision-making capabilities by AI tools, and by the way, this is a structural limitation inherent in large language models. But my main concern is, and this is looking at the future of what education could be, my main concern is the possibility of a future where society would become an end-user of knowledge and not a creator of knowledge, right? And as a youth advocate, I’d like to talk more about this and how we can give a few characteristics of what good education of the future could look like and what it should do. So first, good education should instill a level of deep thinking and curiosity for knowledge. And there are some tools, new tools now, that where you have large language models, they use the Socratic methods with students where they ask them questions, get them engaged, and reach answers on their own. And there will be sharp and critical. The value we can see from that and the idea here is, the vision here is generation should be able to use AI to support their thinking and not replace their thinking. Second, good educators should be a source of inspiration and guidance for students, and we should really focus on enabling and supporting this direction. The idea here is someone who is inspired with AI to just get the answer, while someone who’s inspired will use AI to help the answer and foster. Third, good education would foster self-learning and empower lifelong learners who would think collectively and not individually. On this, I think that’s something we have to practice as we teach. One example that I would think of is developing learning hubs that we can spread around the globe, where students, policy makers, technology development can come together and discuss ideas, come out and see how they get feedback, what worked, what didn’t work, and then that helps with integration and really pushing it forward. I’ll give here an idea, I think that I will close it. The idea of technology adoption curve, if you’re familiar with it, you have your normal bell curve that starts with your pioneers, your Steve Wozniak, the magician of technology. Then you have your early adopters, which is about 10-15 percent of the population, and it turns out this is the section that really drives the maturity and adoption of technology. Those are the people who will stand in line to wait for the new iPhone for hours. Those are the people who will tell you how good it is and what needs to improve. Then you have your average adopter, the majority adopters, those are the practical people who want to think about, how will I use the technology? How will it help me without really taking much of my time? Then you have the late adopters, those who are either not able or not interested in adopting it early on. In developing these learning hubs, we really want to think about how we can help more people, facilitate for more people to become early adopters, and get them involved in the discussion and engaged early on. Then you can have the effects go from a local to a global level. Thank you very much.

Ihita Gangavarapu: Thank you so much for your points. It sets a lot of context for the upcoming discussions. I now request Mr. Henry Werdia, the Ambassador for Digital Affairs from Government of France. My question to you is, France, the rich initiatives to address AI, how do you see AI impacting education? And what principles should guide the development and implementation of AI in the educational settings?

Henri Verdier: Thank you very much. That’s a question. It’s impossible to answer in five minutes, but I will try to share some view. But first, let’s recall that when we speak about AI on education, we speak about at least three different things. We speak about how to use AI for education. And of course, we can dream of a world with, for example, more personalized education. If a model could tell me, you don’t understand mathematics because you didn’t understand this two years ago, and I will fix it, and now you can continue. That’s, of course, a dream. We also have to think about education to AI. So we need skills and literacy and, frankly speaking, a human with absolutely no AI literacy won’t be as free as they could soon. So we need to empower a bit and to prepare. And we need to prepare our children to the world of AI, a world, a very complex world, where if you don’t know how to do your job with AI, you will lose your job, where we’ll constantly live with small companions that will always obey and serve us. But that’s not a good way to become a great human being, to never oppose, to be surrounded by a servile model. So that’s a very different question. And that’s important, too. The youth represent a vulnerable group. We have a duty to let them become citizens and free human beings. They have rights, and we have to pay much more attention that most users of AI. I say this because, of course, everything we are doing in the field of AI regulation and governance matters for education. And let’s start with general principles. We need to find some trade models. You need to respect the UNESCO ethical principles and the strong ethics. You need to avoid bias and to pay attention. In order to make this, we need to conceive, because we don’t have it, a way to audit AI model and in a democratic way. The problem is not just a few experts coming to me and saying, no, I did audit the model, it’s great. We need a society to be able to have a conversation regarding the models. And for this, we need to conceive new strategies. We need to avoid, not bias, but just a lazy confirmation of current inequalities. So, for example, today, as you know, if I ask to the AI, show me a CEO, it will propose a white, 50 years old man, so like me. Because today, the average CEO is like this, but it will change, and the AI has to change, too, or to prepare. So this is not just for education. education but that are very important question if you don’t fix it you will have trouble for education then maybe you have questions that are more educational we need to to save a spirit of public service education is a fundamental right so of course the market can help us companies can help us we have research but we have to be sure that it will remain a public service we probably need let’s imagine if we end with a world with one giant company teaching every children of the world we are lost that’s finished so we need a diversity of solution respecting cultural diversities and needs of every countries so that’s very important we need to be sure that the principle of equity equal access non-discrimination will be preserved we in France we think that for this we need a kind of public infrastructure at some level we cannot just rely on self-regulation from an oligopoly of few companies so we have to to think about what is a public service of educational AI so that’s our some question probably and I quite finished because the five minutes are running fast probably the international community will have to conceive a framework for knowledge and education we cannot let capture we’ll produce a lot of knowledge with AI with all those data but can they be the property of the companies that will build this knowledge you know we live in a world where we live because there is a public science because there is a common knowledge and you can innovate and create value on whatever because there is also a common knowledge so what is a common knowledge that we need to share regarding AI and this I don’t think that we have a strong conversation regarding this question and I conclude with this, and that’s not just because we are at the IGF Youth. We need to engage the youth from the beginning. I think this deeply and frankly, not just because I’m the father of two daughters, 18 and 20, but we will need new solutions. We need strong innovation and brave innovation. We need ideas coming out of the box. And for this, we need to engage very early the youth. And for example, to prepare the Paris AI Summit, we did work with IGF France and other organizations, and we did organize some sessions and workshops on Akathon. We did just ask to young, which kind of education do you dream about? And I was very interested by the answer. So for example, all the ideas were ideas with a personal AI in my pocket that I did teach myself and I know the model and the model doesn’t know me so well. So they don’t want, they didn’t, those young that did work with us, they didn’t want one big central AI model somewhere in the United States. They wanted their personal companion that they teach themselves. And that was interesting because that was instinctive. They didn’t really think about it. But for them, a good future is a future where the AI works for me in my pocket with my prompt and not a future where someone did decide somewhere about my future. So that was very, very interesting for me.

Ihita Gangavarapu: Thank you. Thank you, Mr. André. You mentioned a lot of concerns, Robert, that meaning as a community, we need to address, we need to think about and also deliberate. You know, that brings me to my next question, which is directed to Ms. Margaret. This is on, when we talk about cooperation and collaboration, what can policy makers do for AI to support and push education for everyone? And how can global collaboration be fostered to address the challenges and opportunities in the AI field, particularly in education?

Margaret Nyambura Ndung’u: Thank you, Madam Moderator. Good morning, good afternoon, and good evening to all of the distinguished panelists. It’s a great honor to join you in these 2020. for IGF, and I’m glad that I’m able to join you online, and extend my gratitude to the host country, Saudi Arabia, for organizing this and the UN Secretariat. Going into the question, the intersection of artificial intelligence and education presents both profound opportunities and pressing challenges. As we delve into this discussion, I would like to frame my remarks on the two key areas that you have asked, what policymakers can do to ensure artificial intelligence supports education for all, and how global collaboration can address the challenges and opportunities for artificial intelligence. Policymakers have a critical role in ensuring that artificial intelligence becomes a force multiplier for inclusive and equitable education, as envisioned in the UN Sustainable Development Goal Number 4. To achieve this, there is a need to focus on accessibility, addressing the digital divide, and safeguard equity, among others. Artificial intelligence-powered tools must be designed with inclusivity at their core, ensuring they cater to learners with diverse needs, including those enabled differently, and those in underserved communities. Governments should incentivize the development of open-source artificial intelligence tools and platforms that democratize access to quality education content. This can be done or can be achieved through following universal design principles, also using artificial intelligence to create personalized learning experiences that adapt to individuals’ needs, such as text-to-speech capabilities for visually impaired learners, or speech recognition tools for those with hearing disabilities. We also must focus on multilingual support through equipping artificial systems with language translation capabilities, especially for local and indigenous languages, to bridge linguistic barriers for learners in underserved communities and across all communities. Again, we are talking about collaborative platforms through promoting the creation of open-source educational platforms that pool resources and expertise globally, making high-quality content accessible to all. learners regardless of location or socio-economic support. And finally, we are talking supporting development of localized content that is culturally relevant and content-specific learning materials that resonate with the local communities. Distinguished delegates, the second area I would like to focus on is the issue of digital divide. Artificial intelligent potentials can only be harnessed if all learners have access to the necessary digital infrastructure. Policymakers must prioritize investments in affordable and reliable internet connectivity and digital devices, particularly in rural and marginalized areas. Addressing the digital divide through artificial intelligence in education requires comprehensive strategies that ensure all learners have access to the digital infrastructure and tools necessary to benefit from artificial intelligence-powered solutions. By focusing on infrastructure, affordability, and inclusivity, and combining efforts across stakeholders, AI can be a transformative tool to overcome the digital divide and provide equitable education opportunities for all learners. I must say we are doing a lot of infrastructure development, looking at affordability, and looking at capacity building as a country. Distinguished delegates, safeguarding equity is important in leveraging AI to back education for all. We must mitigate the risk of bias in AI algorithms that could exacerbate existing inequalities. Policymakers should establish regulatory frameworks that ensure transparency and fairness in the design and deployment of AI in education. To safeguard equity in leveraging AI for education for all, several strategies must be adopted to ensure AI supports inclusivity and does not inadvertently perpetuate or exacerbate existing inequalities. I know we all know across the continent and more in Africa that these inequalities exist. The third area that I would like to focus on is the element of fostering global collaboration. Global collaboration is not merely a choice, but a necessity to harness AI potential in education responsibly. By working together, governments, institutions, and the private sector can ensure that AI contributes to inclusive high-quality education for all. The challenges and opportunities presented by AI in education are inherently global, and so must be our response. Collaborative efforts are essential in shaping an inclusive digital future that includes strengthening international partnership. Governments, education institutions, private sector actors, and the civil society must work together to develop shared standards and best practices for AI in education. Multilateral organizations like the UN can provide platforms for dialogue and cooperation. With these, again, we bring the education institutions because we are talking of our young people, our youth, to ensure that they are fully integrated. Governments, education institutions, private sector, and civil society must come together to develop shared standards and best practices that ensure AI’s ethical, equitable, and effective integration into education systems. Sharing knowledge and resources is one key area of fostering global collaboration. And we are seeing a transformative potential of artificial intelligence in addressing global challenges, particularly in education, health, and education development, calls for equitable access to AI technologies and expertise. Countries with advanced AI capabilities bear a responsibility to ensure their knowledge, resources, and innovations with those that are still developing the AI ecosystem. Some of the key strategies is promoting digital public goods. We are talking of global research collaborations. We are talking of capacity building and knowledge transfer. Once we do that and ensure that we are exchanging knowledge, and particularly when we are talking about digital public goods, advanced AI nations can support the development and dissemination of open source AI tools. Data sets and platforms as digital public goods, ensuring accessibility for all, and a collaborative platform can facilitate the adoption of these tools in under-resourced regions fostering inclusion. As we discuss this, empowering youth participation is one of the core issues of this forum. forum to consider. And again, this is a youth forum. And we are saying that empowering youth through global collaboration is critical to shaping an ethical, inclusive, and forward-looking AI ecosystem. By giving young people a seat at the table and fostering their active engagement, we can ensure that AI policies and practices resonate well with the aspirations of the next generation, safeguarding a future where technology serves humanity. And finally, the last but not least area is ethical AI development that is equally critical in fostering global collaboration. By embedding ethical principles into the design and implementation of AI systems, we can build global trust. This includes respecting cultural context and safeguarding data privacy and security, especially for vulnerable populations. Global collaboration is critical to embedding ethical principles in the design, deployment, and use of AI systems. By leveraging shared values and diverse perspectives, the international community can ensure that AI development aligns with the principles of fairness, inclusivity, and respect for human rights, fostering global trust. Thank you, moderator.

Ihita Gangavarapu: Thank you so much for your points. I think very well captured a policymaker’s perspective on the various concerns that we have, as well as such certain ways with respect to collaboration how these concerns can be addressed. Now I’ll hand it over to Ms. Carolyn to take it forward.

Carol Roach: Thank you very much. We had a lot to digest just now, and it’s basically from a lot of us with the gray hair, except honorable hair. So now it’s time to hear from the youth, especially based on what we’ve heard and the desire to really engage the youth and not just as figureheads but to really get you involved and sitting at the table. So here’s your question, sorry. You come from Myanmar and are very active in the regional youth initiatives. I see her online all the time. Not everyone has the same opportunities. What policies are necessary to prevent the digital divide from widening due to AI implementations in education?

Phyo Thiri Lwin: Thank you for introducing me a bit. I feel like as from the perspectives of the young people from the developing country, we are also trying our best to catch up every day as the way we can. Because I know that there are also the academy in the private sector which are trying to train the young people. Younger generation, I’m Gen Z anyway, but they are trying to educate and train them to learn more about the AI, the Gen F, let’s say. So that is highlighting that even though there are many things are happening in many developing countries, we are still trying our best to catch up the best, not to miss any kinds of the opportunity. But there are also the challenges for, you know, like assessing the education, because for example, developing the infrastructure related to the AI is quite expensive, especially for those in the private sector academy or the school or university. They are quite challenging with the, you know, funding and also the investment related to the, let’s say, like the setup, the learning hub in the developing country related to the AI. That is one of the challenges that I see. Another challenge would be related to the accessible education. Internet has been challenging for us to assess the technology in the developing country. Maybe it is related to the geopolitical related matters. So, you know what, without Internet, I don’t think we can learn continuous learning about the AI and also we can empower the young people to continue their education. So if we are talking about the AI in education, the Internet is also important for us to get access. So for preventing the digital device, that’s a question. So if you prevented the digital device from the AI, learning from the AI education, I personally feel like at least we need to get access to the Internet as a fundamental right. Then we can continue to shape the policy. Even if there is a challenge at the policymaker level, we can shape our society and community at the very ground level, like at school or university. We can change the policy. We can allow students to use the AI at least. But the educators also need to be open-minded for using the AI. What I experienced is that for assessing the AI, let’s say even though the students want to use the AI too, some of the educators stay narrow-minded. It’s a very derogatory way to say, but I feel like they are very concerned for cheating on the assignments or something like that. I can feel from their perspective why they are concerned for cheating on the assignments using the AI technology. But from the learner’s perspective, like me, I have a challenge. I’m not a native speaker in English, right? I need the AI assistant to revise my idea in a better version, let’s say, kind of like this. I feel like at the school or university level, we can shape the ground policy at the school and university at least to grant access to the students for using the AI too. But one concern might probably be the assessment system because many students, maybe students can also cheat using the AI technology, right? Maybe we need to change their exam system, maybe assessment system as well. That is the way what we can do, and even from the educator’s side, I personally feel like it’s better to change their exam system or assessment system on the way. I’m mentioning about at the ground level what we can shape our society by changing the policy at the school or university, right? But at the higher level of the policymaking for the developing country, and also there are always the big gap between developing countries and the developed countries. But the thing is that we can share our resources to each other because we are all human beings. One of the speakers said we have to think about the diversity and inclusion, and we can also share the resources, at least sharing the information and also sharing the opportunity to learn about the AI. Let’s say this speaker mentioned about the AI Summit in France, right? So maybe we can give the opportunity to the young people to go and learn what is happening in the developed country by attending the AI Summit. Kind of like that, this is also the opportunity and also empowering them to do something back in their initiative at the local level. For example, if we invite the educator or learner, both of them get a chance to attend the AI Summit, that might be probably very beneficial for them to share their best and how to be open-minded using the AI technology. Yeah, that is a way how we can share the resources among us and also at the global level. We should not leave anyone behind in this AI evolution and revolution period and era. We have to bring everyone as much as we can by shaping our educational policy at the ground level and also at the higher level of the position.

Carol Roach: Thank you, Fio. I think what we hear repeating here is that… Very good, thank you. We hear repeating here that we need some kind of corporate responsibility in terms of helping countries to develop their AI because it is an expensive endeavor and we need them. I totally agree with regards to the change of mindset, especially of the educators, probably of parents as well, so that the youth have a say and just don’t look at AI as a negative, but to embrace the positive part. And for us to embrace the positive part, yes, we do need that mindset change. We are going to now hear from Umut online. Can you hear us? Umut? You can hear? Okay. Yeah. Okay, so as we sort out the technology, let’s move on to our next question. Minister Amal, this is a big one for you. After hearing all of what’s being said of these important views, both from the youth and from others of the older generation, what preoccupies your attention as a decision maker on AI implications for education? It’s a big one.

Amal El Fallah Seghrouchni: Thank you very much. Yes, it’s a huge question, but I will start with the dream. My dream is to keep young people as far as possible from computers because I think they spend already a lot of time connected and very close from machines. And I think that AI should be used when it has a real added value. And we have to discuss what does it mean, added value. For example, if you use AI to simulate classroom, this is something you cannot do alone as teacher. So you need a tool to simulate this classroom, to simulate interaction with students, etc. And in this situation, AI can provide some benefits. And I would like to say something just to set up the scene. For me, in 18, there was already education-based AI. We call this enseignement assisté par ordinateur, assisted with computer. Education assisted. And it started many, many years ago, like 40 years ago. And there was a lot of advances in mathematics, in science, etc. And then we scale up from this basic AI-assisted teaching to serious game, for example. And gaming becomes something very important in many, many situations, not only at school but also in companies, etc. Because it puts the person in a situation of learning. And then we started thinking about more personalized experience with AI. And we got this generative AI very recently, in 2000, maybe GPT, 2022. But generative AI started like five years before. And this gen AI can have, like, very interesting features. And I will go back to this. But also some bad features. Like for example, plagiarism is something we met. All education system is disturbed by this. Chat GPT, you started by saying maybe chat GPT can give me the answer. So let’s focus on the positive aspects. For example, the voice. The voice in generative AI is very useful for education. And we started developing a lot of apps, for example, for translation from one language to another one. And using some an approach based from speech to text or from text to speech. And this is very useful in particular in the global south. Because you have to face literacy. And you have to face multilanguage. If you go to Africa, for example, in one country, you have to deal with, like, 15 or 20 languages. Different languages. And generative AI helps us to move to shift from one language very smoothly to another one. And this is, I think, the real added value in education of generative AI. Now, just when I listen to you, I think there is a very huge problem. Again, if we focus on the global south, it’s about connection, connectivity. It’s something very difficult to have everywhere. The infrastructure is also a huge problem if you deal with large language models. So we have to find some new approaches. For example, in France, there is a very nice group working on frugal AI and trustworthy AI in the sense that we need to certify that the output of AI are very accurate. And also, they don’t need a huge amount of data and not very big or very large models. And also, the access to platforms. If you put the apps on platforms, people should be able to access. So I think maybe the thing that is crucial is about ethical aspects of AI and education. We have already some dividend on numerical stuff should not exceed more. I mean, if you have people that have access to learning with very sophisticated tools while others don’t have access, you have this problem of accessibility and equity. Transparency. There is also a need to maintain clarity about how AI systems function and make decisions. We have been now, we moved from automatization of systems to autonomy of systems with AI. And this autonomy allows some systems, educational systems to, for example, to make decisions about orientation, to make decisions about access to the university, et cetera. And this is related also to accountability. We need to explain why this person will get this kind of access or not. Another topic, very important, is data privacy and cognitive rights in education. Because you know, data is something very important to protect. And in particular, if you deal with cognitive data, it’s much more important. So there is a possibility to trace all the cognitive data and to manipulate, to apply some nudging on this cognitive data to go ahead with a lot of manipulations at large scale. And finally, I would like to mention all the problems related to AI, like gaze in data, you know, this book of Invisible Woman. There are a lot of problems related to the use of data and we rely on data and gaze algorithm also. So just to summarize, there is the problem of data, there is the problem of infrastructure, and also there is the problem of design. How to make AI trustworthy in particular in the case of education?

Carol Roach: Thank you very much. We hear a lot of different terms of ethical AI, but I think I like trustworthy AI. So we’ll have to use that a little bit more as well. Is Umut on? Okay, Umut, so here is your question and welcome. Okay. What are the youth in Latin America and the Caribbean thinking when it comes to who should be held accountable for decisions made by AI systems in educational environments? Take it away.

Umut Pajaro Velasquez: Okay. everyone on good day or good evening wherever you are. When it comes to decisions on how or who is going to be held accountable in AI decisions, well actually in Latin America we think that actually this has many problems related to internet governance. It’s a problem that should be addressed by several stakeholders at the same time. Probably the main stakeholders that can be held accountable for decisions made by AI systems in educational environments requires careful consideration of the role and responsibilities of first of all developers. AI developers have the responsibility to design and develop AI systems that are ethical, unbiased and transparent. They should ensure that their system and train on diverse and representative data sets especially in a region like Latin America where we have so many cultural nonsense and different languages and all of that and also ensure that the AI system especially that the ones that we’re using for education are designed to protect student privacy. Educators have a role in this aspect on accountability also and I’m an educator so we talk about this a lot of time and despite a lot of people say that most of the educators have some resistance to AI, I think it’s the opposite. Probably most of the educators don’t know exactly what is the responsibility in all this process so they don’t know exactly how to you’re saying somehow, so they feel more afraid because they don’t know. No, actually they are against it to the use of the technology. So educator here has to play a crucial role in implementing AI system in the classroom. Mostly, most of the educators need to be trained on how to use AI effectively and ethically, and they should be involved in the decision making process regarding how AI is used in the schools. So that means that educators should be involved also in the implementation and the policy making processes, not only being the ones that receive some education to implement those tools, but also the ones that decide how it’s going to be implemented and how to be going to be regulated. They use all these tools inside of the classroom. And the other stakeholders that can be considered important here is obviously the policymakers. Policymakers have a responsibility with all the society to create regulations, guidelines, and guidelines that the government that use AI in education. These policies should be addressed issues such as data privacy, algorithm bias, and obviously accountability. And students, because they are also part of the process, we can’t avoid having some great accountability without including students inside of this conversation. Without them, it’s impossible to actually address fully the encompass or the complexity of having AI education tools. and on making them accountable for the use of the tools because it’s not only developers that are going to be accountable for it, it’s all we need to see in all the process, not only in the design stage, but until the deployment and implementation on it. Students themselves should be empowered to understand how AI is being used in their education and how to have a voice in the decision-making processes. They should be educated about the potential benefits and risks of AI and encouraged to critically evaluate the information generated by AI systems. Students in this case, they need not only proper education to know how to use the tools, but also some critical thinking on how and when they are starting using the tools because most of the students are using the tools, so we can avoid that. We have to think that accountability is a really complex topic to talk about. Probably with five minutes, we don’t have enough time to cover everything about accountability, but what we can say is that accountability should be something that should be shared among all stakeholders. It requires a collaborative approach that prioritises ethical consideration, transparencies and the wellbeing of the students because the students are the main focus on the education system. Before I forget, another stakeholder that should be taken into account is academia. Academia should actually need to understand and investigate AI is affecting the education, not only in the practices, and then inside of the classroom, but outside of the classroom, and how it’s changing the dynamics on how a student can learn and improve their abilities, or their abilities inside of the classroom, or for their daily lives. So academia needs to understand the pedagogy, the didactical and the pedagogical aspects that are being affected by the use of artificial intelligence tools in the classroom. So there is another stakeholder that should be taking account in this. So we can have AI more accountable in education, that actually is transparent, fairness, has a human oversight, respect the privacy of the student, proponents to equity, and is child-friendly. So that’s my approach to it. Thank you.

Carol Roach: Thank you very much. So we can see that the number of critical stakeholders are growing here. We have government, the technical community, and of course, academia. After listening to all the talks, I have a question running around in my head, but I have to leave it running for one more speaker, and then I’ll put it out to you. So Mr. Khalid. Sorry. Just go ahead, okay. Right, so I get to put out my running question. So I’ll be honest, I have not used one single AI tool. And I’ll tell you why. It’s because, you can still hear me? Yeah, okay. It’s because of what was said. at the beginning and I think it’s from Mr. Khalid. Hold on. Am I gonna be enhancing what I do or diluting? Is it really gonna be me, is it a thousand other people? So I’m going to put it out to you who’ve probably used AI. How do you feel ethically, personally, when you use an AI tool to help you, as Vajo said, to enhance? Do you think that you’re really enhancing? What do you do to help your ethical compass? So I’m throwing that question out to you in the audience.

Henri Verdier: Very brief comment. Indeed, you did use AI tools a lot. If you take a picture with your iPhone, that’s AI. If you do receive some advertising on the web or within a social network, that’s done with AI. If you do receive information in your social network, the feed, that’s AI. And that’s a wicked aspect of the problem because you don’t always notice that AI is everywhere. And maybe that’s the most important because we cannot confront and contest and discuss democratically because decisions are made and we don’t even know that there are decisions.

Carol Roach: No, I agree. I agree that sometimes we don’t know, but I’m throwing it out there in terms of I do know. So when you look at Zoom, you have the little AI apps you can use, WhatsApp, everywhere you turn. But right up in now, I don’t know if they’re trying to be ethical, you have to click a button to say, yes, I want to use it. So I’m looking at the point where I click and say, yes, I want to use it. But thank you. You’re quite right.

Jarrel James: Hi, my name is Jerrell James. I’m a researcher for… or internet resiliency. And I do a lot of work with AI and a lot of concerns that Ahmed has made are… Also, I’ve heard him talk about them before, but I have them as well. And so I think what you’re discussing there is like consensual data mining, consensual activity with AI. And I think when I use it myself and my hesitations right now around using it, which is something I would love to hear the panel discuss, I think for me, I’m wondering about who is responding to me in the sense like who… It’s a large language model. So whose language, whose background, whose perspective is diluting my creativity? Whose background perspective is diluting my output? Because I really value the fact that I come from East Africa, I am well-trained and well-educated in all sorts of things in the West, but I am applying that education through this perspective and this lens. And when I use AI tools, I often notice that I almost have to give the AI my philosophy first, and I have to write out logical prompts that give if-then statements, like if I believe this, then this is my outcome of what I would like to see. And I almost have to deprogram the AI from the language model that it exists in currently. And so I would love to hear, yeah, Ahmed, I think you are ready to go on this, but I’d love to hear more about, instead of just owning how it’s implemented regulatory-wise, who are the people in the… Do you see Global South members being the next Steve Jobs of AI, or these big innovators in AI, or is it going to follow the same path of the foreign delegates or the corporations come in and they give you these language models, and then you have to decide what’s true or not? Thank you.

Ahmad Khan: So maybe first I’ll start with the concern that you raised, and this goes to what the ambassador said. Really, I think we blew the social media. Why is it that someone in a different continent get to decide what I watch on my phone for two to four hours? And I’m not mentioning any names, Mark Zuckerberg. But for AI specifically, so the idea of how the technology works, basically, it’s a large language model, as in it takes data and it learns what the data says, and it can predict the next word. This is what it learns. So you take a bunch of information from the internet. So what it learns, on average, is the average content you see. So without any post-training, this is what you get, the average response you would get in the internet. But then there is the fine-tuning that happens after, be more supportive, give it more information, be this and that, and then it learns some concepts that can provide you with the direction that you can give it, right? So how it happens now is the different companies control for these things, and they ensure that it’s trustworthy in a sense. They try to make their own best judgment in terms of how to use it. And then we become end-users. So now the question is, again, back to the point, how can we push it to use AI so that I can tell it what I want, and it serves me and not the company? And this is really what we want to focus on. And I think this really is an overlap between the capabilities of the technology itself and then what we do with it. And I’ll leave the floor if there’s any more comments, if anyone wants to add more to this.

Carol Roach: Next.

AUDIENCE: Can you hear me okay? Brilliant. So thank you so much for that, Ahmed. And I think my experience as a young person utilizing AI, especially in, you know, I’m a consultant, my job is quite professional, is I usually struggle to get it to give me an objective stance. Whatever prompts I give it, it ends up speaking to what I’m feeding it, which is not necessarily what I want, right? I want this thing to challenge me, to give me some sort of objective truth. So I guess my question to you is, do you think an objective truth exists in the sense of AI, or is it always going to be manipulated to a certain extent by its users and the community that utilizes AI technology?

Ahmad Khan: Yeah, I think, again, this is a bigger question of what’s right and what’s wrong overall, right? But AI will give you the answer that it has learned. And in that sense, it’s always objective. And if you tell it, I want you to challenge me, then it will try to challenge you. And this is what it’s good at. So if you use it for what it’s built for, it’s great. But if you use it, try to extend it further than what it should do, then it will fail. And then we say the company is responsible for it. If you use a knife that’s supposed to cut things and it cuts your finger, maybe you didn’t use it right. Maybe it wasn’t too sharp. So we have to really know what the limits of AI is before we really try to use it for all intents and purposes, right? In terms of how we can actually use it to get logical and objective answers, there are tools now. So large language models learn an intuition from data. So this is what they get. If anyone is familiar with the system one, system two, it’s the fast thinking process of intuition. It just learns intuition, but it doesn’t have a structure for logic. There are now hybrid models that they’re developing that can actually ensure something is logically and reasonably objectively making sense. And that’s something we can incorporate into developing tools. I think that would take longer. So maybe hold on to ask it what the meaning of life is until we get that answer.

Henri Verdier: A very brief comment regarding your question. So the current model, we are built by companies to sell something. So they try to be bureaucrats and the others. They didn’t always answer. Sometimes they told, are you sure that this is your question? Do you know why you are asking this question? There will always be answers. And when they don’t know, they do invent. And when they don’t invent, they hallucinate. But they will always agree to answer. And for me, that’s my worst concern.

Ihita Gangavarapu: Very well answered, actually. Just quickly before we proceed, I just want to check with our online moderators. Ines and Keith, do we have any questions or comments online? I see that we have a comment or question from Lily. If you’d like to speak, please.

Lily Edinam Botsyoe: Hi, everyone. Good morning and sorry morning from here as I’m in Cincinnati, Ohio and excited to join the conversation. So one of the things I wanted to say early on was the fact that Madam Carol had mentioned that she had not, and then she actually clarified it so I’m going to point out the fact that in using our emails and our calendars, there’s the subtle use of AI so much so that it enhances productivity in one way or the other. We all are using and so for somebody who’s a youth and coming from the angle of perspective of answering if it adds any efficiency or is effective for me, first off it is. But secondly, I’m a PhD researcher in privacy. So my concerns actually go towards the idea of privacy and I share the sentiment of the speaker who took the microphone the first time to say whose perspective is it may be spotlighting for me, right? And so in that aspect, one of the things that we start to look at is even what these companies are doing. For example, ChargeGPT. I’ve discussed so much about my dissertation with ChargeGPT that when I ask a question, it brings elements of my past work into the prompt or into the response it gives to me. One of the things that I think that they’re doing is that when you start a conversation, you can toggle a button and say, hey, don’t train with my information or don’t train using my data. For one step, it is a way for people to say, hey, I’m looking into my privacy and maybe I don’t want this to be used in training this large model for others to be a part of. But one of the conversations is that aside from what these companies are doing, we are speaking about responsibility. And for us as people who are probably looking to be private and secure while using AI tools, we will also start thinking about how we know and understand what these tools are. And first off, look out for our own security. Are you uploading your social security numbers? Are you uploading passwords? What else are you doing out there that probably can land into the training of these models? Remember, like what the minister said, he said, this is a machine learning that this AI tools are using. there’s natural language processing that they’re using, or even these tools acting like the human brain. And so it brings about that neural network part of AI. In that sense, we all are using the tool, but for us also, we have to take the time to also learn for ourselves and make sure we are taking proactive approaches to protect ourselves while these companies and policies and every other thing also works in place. So from my point of view, AI supports me, but I also look out for privacy because it is huge. And if you don’t think of it as for yourself, the companies would only play a secondary role in your information probably may be used in training these models.

Carol Roach: Okay, thank you very much. That was very helpful. The next speaker online, we have quite a queue here. So please, we’re asking everybody to stick to the two minutes. I think we’re down to maybe a one minute intervention so that persons can have a chance to get involved. Thank you.

Ahmad Karim: Hello, everyone. Hello. Are you listening? Hello, I’m not getting. Go ahead. Hello, thank you so much for the insights. My name is Amad Karim, I’m from Year in Women. And I have two questions. The first one is that we see a very wide gap between two conversations when it comes to AI. Global North, it talks about AI and the opportunity that would bring is the economy of everyone. And in Global South, if the threats and the protection side of AI and technology, how can we guarantee that we have, women and girls have that side in the conversation where they are, the systems are aware of the concerns and their safety measures and concerns, but it does not defy the opportunity space where we can have more girls and women shape that whole industry. And then the second question related to bias and AI. We know that there are biases related to the data itself. AI inherited our history, our civilization, tens of thousands of years. of biases, again, it’s women and girls, and this is what we’re also receiving from AI input, but also the algorithm bias when it comes to those who are creating AI, mostly men, creating softwares for other men, and then with a smaller percentage of women in the AI industry, that’s also a perpetuated application. And then the last part is the bias in the users. Those who have already gender biases and to asking the wrong questions, and how can we make sure that we are, who is responsible for fixing the AI that would work for women and girls? Thank you.

Carol Roach: We’ll go back to the online speaker after you have a response to a question that was put to us. All right, we’ll go to the online.

AUDIENCE: Hi, I would like to answer the last part of the question that talk about our gender bias on AI, because that’s related to my work. So yeah, one of the things that we can do, well, we can actually blame AI for being gender biased when we actually create the data that fit the AI system with those biases. The biases exist in the society, so we need first of all, change the cultural background of the entire society in order to have less gender bias in artificial intelligence. We can actually improve the language sometimes when we are talking about language models, and when we can do it, that’s actually what I’m trying to do with it. with my language that is Spanish is to actually improve those models in the way that actually the representation and the outputs that the people receive when it comes to gender are more equal when it comes to men’s representation of things and women’s representation of things. So it’s hard when you have some languages that actually are so strong, have some representation of gender inside of it, and there is a cultural background that actually is really, really, really, really gendered. So it’s not going to be easy to tackle the gender bias, but we should try, as many people are trying to do it at the moment. So what we can pretend with one of the things that I say to people that I want to improve the models related to gender, gender, gender, gender bias on AI is actually start feeding the data with more related things than women and other genders to how they spread themselves and what they do in the more common things. So it would be helpful for that AI, for the different AI models to give a less gender response to the problems that they receive. So, yeah, that’s what I wanted to say.

Carol Roach: Thank you very much. Very, very helpful. And you’re quite right. It’s almost a circular argument there with regards to what AI is learning, feeding from what we have vetted and feeding from our biases. So we do need to look at how to address that. Thank you very much. I’m going to take… Okay, the persons on the floor to really stick to one minute if we’re going to get to the end of the line. I’m going to ask at this time that nobody else join the queue. Thank you. I’m going to ask back from the perspective of global norms or the other.

AUDIENCE: So like when you’re questioning the use to be critical, I’m not sure if you are getting a good environment for them. When we all have the UN organization and everything working on education and technology, however, we don’t have a universal guideline that as someone saying what is pleasureism or not, and you know how much is okay or not, are we giving enough information about that so that you snow? No. Even at my German university, they do not really specify until where is pleasureism and not and how to use it. But then we are straight up to what we should facilitate all the other trends on. I think it’s very complicated, and I think we should really think how we work on this so that we actually inform, and not just telling them to be on the other. Thank you very much. That’s a very good point,

Carol Roach: and we now have five minutes to wrap up, or four minutes. So let’s make it quick. 30 seconds.

Osei Keja: My name is Osei Keja from Ghana, and also a rep from African youth IGF. So this year we had our African youth IGF last November, and the topic was digital governance and emerging technologies, youth participation, amplifying youth voices. One of the recommendations was establish advisory and participatory platforms to involve youth in policy making and governance at regional and national levels. My question is that what kind of methodologies? Oftentimes the youth are sort of an afterthought in all these conversations. How possible, or what kind of methodology or say structures should we put in place so that they are all inclusive? And also, quick one, who are we benchmarking in terms of all these technologies or say policies? Who are we benchmarking? And what is that? Who should we learn from? Who are we benchmarking, and who are we learning from? So to answer our questions. Thank you very much. Very good point, and I would encourage you

Carol Roach: to join the working group on youth and the IGF. We formed that group to try to help some of the things that you said so your voice can be heard actively. Thanks.

Dana Cramer: Hello, Dana Kramer for the Record Youth IGF Canada. I’m curious about how we as students can advocate for AI adoption in our educations. For context, I’m a PhD candidate in Toronto, Canada, and my university has sweeping regulations on AI usage now, which really impacts on how youth can become first movers of AI programs. And then by being first mover have more experience to then enter, for example, that seat at the governance table on it. And our regulations at my university aren’t just CHAT-GPT, but also allowed to review synthesis and dissemination programs. So I’m wondering if the panel could speak to strategies for advocating for having youth be able to use AI in our educations, that then we can be partners and stakeholders in governance tables too. Thank you. I just want to flip the switch a bit here.

Carol Roach: We’ve been asking, or persons have been asking the older generation on how to change. You said you’d like to see a change, but what are your ideas towards change? What are your ideas? How can you ensure, a lecturer, that I can use CHAT-GPT to produce my paper without you worrying what are the guardrails you’re suggesting in that type? I’m just throwing the question out.

Asfirna Alduri: The perfect introduction for my question, or actually my comment. My name is Asmin Alduri. I am part of the Responsible Technology Hub, a youth-led non-profit that is actually working on this question specifically. So one aspect that we do is we actually have spaces that are intergenerational in means of we’re not only giving young people the mic, but we let them actually develop AI. So instead of asking them and serving them all what you want, we ask them the question of give us a solution and then we will have a question or we will go through the problems that you’re actually seeing. That way young people are actually taken serious, they feel respected and on the same level, and the kind of discussions we’re having are way deeper, way more solution-oriented, and way more inclusive of young people, at least for us in Germany. But one aspect that I really wanted to highlight, because I feel like it’s missing, and Minister Villeflach actually brought it up in regards of ethical aspects. We do not talk about click workers. AI has to be developed by labeling data, and that data is being labeled by young people who are super underprivileged, mostly from the global south, not paid well enough. So if we talk about including people and young people in this aspect, we need to include those who are exploited by developing it. And maybe that’s an open question for later on as well. How can we include these young people? This is the most important part for my work, at least. Thank you.

Carol Roach: Insightful. 30 seconds.

AUDIENCE: Okay, sure. Okay, I’m Oliver from Hong Kong Welfare Foundation and I’m auseful investor there. So personally, I majored in biology and I use generating AI for extended learning, for example, for accessing undergraduate knowledge and academic essays. So what has been proved is that the generating AI gives BAs a misunderstanding about the STEM topic. So how can they use scientific researcher or the STEM student to make sure that, or to judge that the response is correct? And who should actually be responsible for the false information that’s being given by the AI? I’m sorry, my two speakers, I’ve been given the signal to end. I can’t even do a wrap-up.

Carol Roach: So I’m very sorry about that. We cannot take any more speakers. However, we cannot take anybody else again. However, I think we started a very good conversation. Now the point is take it past a conversation. Now we wanna take it to action. I think sometimes for youth is that I’m gonna ask the older generation, this is my problem, how are you gonna fix it? Now we’re gonna flip it around and say, I have a problem with you guys. How are you gonna fix it? So keep that in mind, please. And thank you very much for your participation. Go ahead.

AUDIENCE: Just a second, I think also one good way is I have a solution, what do you think about it? Instead of how do you fix my problem, this is a solution, what do you think about it? And this is the idea of the learning hubs that come with a solution and see what the policy makers think about it.

Carol Roach: That’s a good way of putting it, yes. Thank you. Thank you, everybody. Give yourselves a good round of applause. Thank you very much. Thank you, online participants. Thank you very much. I’m sorry. Oh, it’s all right. My roommates are here. It’s still going and I can definitely somehow am closing it out for you. I like that approach. It’s good to make it.

Agreement Points

AI has potential to personalize and enhance education

Li Junhua

Amal El Fallah Seghrouchni

Phyo Thiri Lwin

AI can personalize learning experiences and adapt to individual needs

AI can simulate classroom interactions and provide benefits teachers cannot alone

AI tools can help non-native speakers enhance their language skills

Multiple speakers agreed that AI has the potential to improve education by personalizing learning experiences, simulating classroom interactions, and assisting with language skills.

Need for ethical considerations and accountability in AI education

Amal El Fallah Seghrouchni

Ahmad Khan

Umut Pajaro Velasquez

Lily Edinam Botsyoe

Transparency and fairness are needed in AI systems making educational decisions

Data privacy and cognitive rights need protection when using AI in education

Companies controlling AI models need to ensure they are trustworthy

Multiple stakeholders including developers, educators, policymakers and students share accountability for AI in education

Users need to be aware of their own role in protecting privacy when using AI tools

Several speakers emphasized the importance of ethical considerations, transparency, and shared accountability in the development and use of AI in education.

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers highlight the disparity in AI access and perception between developed and developing nations, emphasizing the need to address the digital divide and consider the unique challenges faced by the global south.

Li Junhua

Ahmad Karim

There is a digital divide that hampers AI’s potential, with less than a third of the global population connected to the internet

The global south faces threats and protection concerns regarding AI, while the global north focuses on opportunities

These speakers advocate for increased youth participation in AI governance, development, and implementation, emphasizing the importance of including young people’s perspectives in shaping AI policies and solutions.

Osei Keja

Dana Cramer

Asfirna Alduri

Youth need to be involved in policy making and governance of AI at regional and national levels

Students should advocate for responsible AI adoption in their education to gain experience

Intergenerational spaces where youth can develop AI solutions should be created

Unexpected Consensus

Addressing biases in AI

Unknown speaker

Ahmad Karim

Asfirna Alduri

Gender biases in AI stem from societal biases and need to be addressed culturally

The global south faces threats and protection concerns regarding AI, while the global north focuses on opportunities

Underprivileged workers labeling AI training data, often from the global south, need to be included in discussions

There was an unexpected consensus on the need to address various forms of bias in AI, including gender bias, regional disparities, and the inclusion of underprivileged workers. This consensus highlights a growing awareness of the complex social and cultural dimensions of AI development.

Overall Assessment

Summary

The main areas of agreement included the potential of AI to enhance education, the need for ethical considerations and accountability in AI education, the importance of addressing the digital divide and biases in AI, and the necessity of youth involvement in AI governance and development.

Consensus level

There was a moderate level of consensus among the speakers on these key issues. This consensus suggests a growing recognition of both the opportunities and challenges presented by AI in education, as well as the need for inclusive and ethical approaches to AI development and implementation. The implications of this consensus point towards a need for collaborative, multi-stakeholder efforts to harness the benefits of AI in education while addressing potential risks and inequalities.

Different Viewpoints

Approach to AI in education between Global North and Global South

Ahmad Karim

Li Junhua

The global south faces threats and protection concerns regarding AI, while the global north focuses on opportunities

AI tools are helping reduce learning disparities in various countries

While Li Junhua emphasizes the positive impact of AI in reducing learning disparities globally, Ahmad Karim points out a disparity in perception between the Global North and South, with the latter more focused on threats and protection concerns.

Responsibility for AI accountability in education

Ahmad Khan

Umut Pajaro Velasquez

Companies controlling AI models need to ensure they are trustworthy

Multiple stakeholders including developers, educators, policymakers and students share accountability for AI in education

Ahmad Khan emphasizes the responsibility of companies controlling AI models, while Umut Pajaro Velasquez argues for a shared accountability among multiple stakeholders.

Unexpected Differences

Approach to youth involvement in AI development

Asfirna Alduri

Unknown speaker

Intergenerational spaces where youth can develop AI solutions should be created

Youth should propose solutions to AI challenges rather than just asking older generations to fix problems

While both speakers advocate for youth involvement, their approaches differ unexpectedly. Asfirna Alduri suggests creating collaborative intergenerational spaces, while the unknown speaker proposes a more independent approach where youth develop solutions on their own.

Overall Assessment

summary

The main areas of disagreement revolve around the approach to AI in education between Global North and South, responsibility for AI accountability, data privacy protection, and methods of youth involvement in AI development.

difference_level

The level of disagreement among speakers is moderate. While there are differing perspectives on specific issues, there seems to be a general consensus on the importance of AI in education and the need for responsible development and implementation. These differences highlight the complexity of integrating AI into education globally and emphasize the need for collaborative, multi-stakeholder approaches to address challenges and opportunities.

Partial Agreements

Both speakers agree on the importance of data privacy in AI education, but they differ in their approach. Amal El Fallah Seghrouchni emphasizes the need for systemic protection, while Lily Edinam Botsyoe focuses on individual user responsibility.

Amal El Fallah Seghrouchni

Lily Edinam Botsyoe

Data privacy and cognitive rights need protection when using AI in education

Users need to be aware of their own role in protecting privacy when using AI tools

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers highlight the disparity in AI access and perception between developed and developing nations, emphasizing the need to address the digital divide and consider the unique challenges faced by the global south.

Li Junhua

Ahmad Karim

There is a digital divide that hampers AI’s potential, with less than a third of the global population connected to the internet

The global south faces threats and protection concerns regarding AI, while the global north focuses on opportunities

These speakers advocate for increased youth participation in AI governance, development, and implementation, emphasizing the importance of including young people’s perspectives in shaping AI policies and solutions.

Osei Keja

Dana Cramer

Asfirna Alduri

Youth need to be involved in policy making and governance of AI at regional and national levels

Students should advocate for responsible AI adoption in their education to gain experience

Intergenerational spaces where youth can develop AI solutions should be created

Key Takeaways

AI has significant potential to personalize and enhance education, but also raises ethical concerns around privacy, bias, and accountability

There is a need for global collaboration and inclusive governance to ensure AI benefits education equitably across regions

Youth participation is crucial in shaping AI policies and implementation in education

Addressing biases and the digital divide is essential for AI to truly benefit education globally

Resolutions and Action Items

Establish advisory and participatory platforms to involve youth in AI policy making and governance at regional and national levels

Create intergenerational spaces where youth can develop AI solutions

Improve AI language models to reduce gender biases

Develop ‘learning hubs’ globally for students, policymakers and tech developers to collaborate on AI in education

Unresolved Issues

How to effectively regulate AI use in educational settings without stifling innovation

How to ensure AI enhances rather than replaces critical thinking skills in students

How to address the exploitation of underprivileged workers labeling AI training data

How to validate the accuracy of AI-generated information, especially for STEM topics

Suggested Compromises

Balancing AI assistance in education with preserving human creativity and critical thinking

Finding a middle ground between strict regulations on AI use in education and allowing students to gain experience with AI tools

Developing AI models that serve individual needs while also respecting privacy and data rights

My dream is to keep young people as far as possible from computers because I think they spend already a lot of time connected and very close from machines. And I think that AI should be used when it has a real added value.

speaker

Amal El Fallah Seghrouchni

reason

This comment challenges the assumption that more AI and technology in education is always better, introducing an important counterpoint to the discussion.

impact

It shifted the conversation to consider the potential downsides of AI in education and the importance of using it judiciously, rather than just focusing on its benefits.

How can we push it to use AI so that I can tell it what I want, and it serves me and not the company? And this is really what we want to focus on.

speaker

Ahmad Khan

reason

This comment highlights a crucial issue of user agency and control in AI systems, especially in educational contexts.

impact

It sparked further discussion about the ethical implications of AI and the need for user-centric design in AI tools for education.

We need to engage the youth from the beginning. I think this deeply and frankly, not just because I’m the father of two daughters, 18 and 20, but we will need new solutions. We need strong innovation and brave innovation. We need ideas coming out of the box.

speaker

Henri Verdier

reason

This comment emphasizes the importance of youth involvement in shaping AI policies and practices, recognizing their unique perspectives and potential for innovation.

impact

It led to increased focus on youth participation throughout the rest of the discussion, with several subsequent speakers addressing this point.

AI has to be developed by labeling data, and that data is being labeled by young people who are super underprivileged, mostly from the global south, not paid well enough. So if we talk about including people and young people in this aspect, we need to include those who are exploited by developing it.

speaker

Asfirna Alduri

reason

This comment brings attention to an often overlooked aspect of AI development – the labor conditions of those involved in data labeling.

impact

It broadened the scope of the discussion to include ethical considerations in AI development processes, not just in the end product or its use in education.

Overall Assessment

These key comments shaped the discussion by introducing critical perspectives on the ethical implications of AI in education, the importance of user agency, the need for youth involvement in AI policy and development, and the often-overlooked labor issues in AI creation. They helped to deepen the conversation beyond surface-level benefits of AI in education to consider more complex, systemic issues that need to be addressed for responsible AI implementation in educational settings.

How can we push AI to serve individual users rather than companies?

speaker

Jarrel James

explanation

This is important to ensure AI tools enhance individual creativity and perspective rather than diluting them with generic responses.

Do you see Global South members being the next big innovators in AI?

speaker

Jarrel James

explanation

This is crucial for understanding if AI development will continue to be dominated by certain regions or if there will be more diverse representation in the future.

Does an objective truth exist in AI, or is it always manipulated to some extent by its users and the community that utilizes AI technology?

speaker

Audience member

explanation

This question is important for understanding the limitations and potential biases of AI systems in providing information.

How can we guarantee that women and girls have a voice in AI conversations, addressing both safety concerns and opportunities?

speaker

Ahmad Karim

explanation

This is crucial for ensuring gender equity in AI development and implementation.

Who is responsible for fixing AI to work for women and girls?

speaker

Ahmad Karim

explanation

This question is important for addressing gender biases in AI systems and ensuring accountability.

What kind of methodologies or structures should be put in place to ensure youth are included in AI policy-making and governance?

speaker

Osei Keja

explanation

This is important for ensuring meaningful youth participation in shaping AI policies and governance.

Who are we benchmarking in terms of AI technologies and policies?

speaker

Osei Keja

explanation

This question is crucial for understanding best practices and models in AI development and regulation.

How can students advocate for AI adoption in their educations, particularly in universities with strict regulations?

speaker

Dana Cramer

explanation

This is important for enabling students to gain practical experience with AI and become stakeholders in its governance.

How can we include click workers, who are often underprivileged young people from the Global South, in discussions about AI development?

speaker

Asfirna Alduri

explanation

This question addresses the ethical concerns of AI development and the need to include those who are potentially exploited in the process.

How can scientific researchers or STEM students judge if the responses given by AI are correct, especially for complex topics?

speaker

Oliver

explanation

This is crucial for ensuring the reliability and accuracy of AI-generated information in scientific and academic contexts.

Who should be responsible for false information given by AI?

speaker

Oliver

explanation

This question is important for establishing accountability in AI-generated content and misinformation.

Summary

This discussion focused on sustainability, environmental, social, and governance (ESG) practices, and their integration with digital transformation in organizations. The panel, consisting of experts Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir, Engineer Khaled, and Abdulrahman Al-Majed, explored various aspects of these concepts and their implementation.

The conversation began by defining sustainability and ESG, emphasizing their importance in meeting current needs without compromising future generations’ abilities. The panelists highlighted the interconnectedness of environmental, social, economic, and governance dimensions in sustainability practices. They discussed the role of leadership in promoting sustainability and the impact of legislation and systems on ESG practices.

Risk management in the context of ESG was addressed, with the experts explaining various tools and methods for evaluating and managing ESG-related risks. These included risk mapping, scenario analysis, and specialized assessments like environmental impact analysis and life cycle assessment.

The discussion then shifted to the role of technology in advancing sustainability efforts. The panelists mentioned artificial intelligence, machine learning, blockchain, and big data as key technologies that can support sustainable practices and decision-making processes.

Social responsibility programs aligned with ESG goals were explored, with examples including partnerships with non-profit organizations, educational initiatives, and support for small and medium-sized enterprises. The experts noted that many sectors in Saudi Arabia were already advanced in social responsibility efforts.

The panel concluded by addressing the challenges of integrating ESG practices with digital transformation strategies. Key obstacles identified included resistance to change, the need for mature data, and the importance of proper measurement and governance frameworks. The experts emphasized the need for leadership buy-in and raised awareness to overcome these challenges and move towards a more sustainable future.

Keypoints

Major discussion points:

– The concepts of sustainability and ESG (Environmental, Social, Governance) standards

– The relationship between governance, sustainability, and digital transformation

– Risk management in the context of ESG practices

– Technological advancements and social responsibility programs related to ESG

– Challenges in implementing ESG practices and digital transformation strategies

Overall purpose:

The goal of this discussion was to explore how sustainability, governance, and digital transformation intersect and contribute to achieving sustainable development goals. The panelists aimed to provide insights on implementing ESG practices, managing associated risks, and leveraging technology to create a more sustainable future for organizations.

Overall tone:

The tone of the discussion was professional, informative, and collaborative. The panelists spoke with expertise on their respective topics and built upon each other’s points. There was a sense of optimism about the potential for positive change, balanced with acknowledgment of the challenges involved. The tone remained consistent throughout, maintaining a focus on sharing knowledge and practical insights.

Speakers

– Huda lahaideb: Moderator/host of the discussion

– Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir: Director of Governance at a leading company, coach and consultant in Board of Directors

– Mohandad Khaled: Member of the board of directors, 20 years of experience in GRT

– Abdulrahman Al-Majed: Member of the board of directors of the Association of the Board of Artificial Intelligence, 20 years of experience in internal and global competition

Additional speakers:

– Eid: Member of the board of directors, 20 years of experience in GRT (mentioned but did not speak in the transcript)

Sustainability, ESG, and Digital Transformation: A Comprehensive Discussion

This summary provides an overview of a panel discussion on sustainability, Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) practices, and their integration with digital transformation in organisations. The panel, moderated by Huda lahaideb, featured experts Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir, Mohandad Khaled, and Abdulrahman Al-Majed, who collectively brought extensive experience in governance and artificial intelligence to the conversation.

1. Defining Sustainability and ESG

The discussion began with a foundational exploration of sustainability and ESG concepts. Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir emphasised that sustainability is about meeting current needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. Mohandad Khaled expanded on this by explaining that ESG practices are measurable standards for evaluating organisational performance. This framing helped to distinguish between the broader concept of sustainability and the more specific, quantifiable aspects of ESG.

2. Governance and Leadership in Sustainability

The conversation highlighted the crucial role of governance and leadership in implementing ESG and sustainability practices. Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir emphasised, “Today, one of the secrets of governance and stability, in order to be an integral part of the organisation and the system, is the strategic stability. The language of the leader that prevails over all existing administrations.” This insight underscored the importance of clear strategic direction from leadership in driving ESG initiatives.

Mohandad Khaled added to this point by discussing how legislations and systems affect the governance of environmental and social practices. He noted the importance of aligning organisational strategies with broader national initiatives, such as Saudi Vision 2030, in developing effective ESG practices.

3. Technology and Sustainability

The role of technology in advancing sustainability efforts was a significant point of discussion. Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir mentioned artificial intelligence, blockchain, and big data as key technologies that can enhance sustainability efforts. Abdulrahman Al-Majed supported this view, discussing how specialised tools can support risk management and decision-making processes related to ESG.

However, the panelists also highlighted challenges in implementing these technologies. Abdulrahman Al-Majed emphasised the need for a supportive organisational culture, stating, “Today, we must have a basic culture that supports this direction so that there is adoption of these technologies and work on it.” This comment broadened the discussion to include cultural aspects of ESG implementation, beyond just policies and technologies.

4. Social Responsibility and ESG

The discussion touched on social responsibility programmes aligned with ESG goals. Mohandad Khaled provided specific examples of how organisations can improve community life and align with ESG objectives. These included partnerships with non-profit organisations, educational initiatives, and support for small and medium-sized enterprises. He also mentioned programmes focused on employing people with disabilities and initiatives to reduce carbon emissions.

Notably, both Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir and Mohandad Khaled observed that many social responsibility programmes were in place in Saudi Arabia even before the term ESG became popular, indicating a strong foundation for further ESG development in the region.

5. Challenges in Implementing ESG Practices

The panel addressed several challenges in integrating ESG practices with digital transformation strategies:

– Resistance to change, particularly from leadership, was identified as a significant obstacle by all speakers.

– Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir emphasised the need for mature data and proper measurement frameworks.

– Mohandad Khaled highlighted the importance of clear governance structures and policies.

– Abdulrahman Al-Majed stressed the need for a supportive organisational culture and raised awareness.

The experts agreed that overcoming these challenges requires leadership buy-in and a concerted effort to educate and engage all levels of the organisation.

6. Global Context and Future Directions

Abdulrahman Al-Majed brought attention to the recent COP16 conference, highlighting its significance in shaping global ESG practices. This reference underscored the importance of considering international developments and agreements in organisational ESG strategies.

Conclusion

The discussion provided a comprehensive exploration of sustainability, ESG practices, and their integration with digital transformation. The panelists offered valuable insights into the practical implementation of ESG initiatives, emphasising the critical roles of leadership, technology, and organisational culture. They also highlighted the need for alignment with broader national and international sustainability goals.

As organisations continue to navigate the complex landscape of sustainability and ESG in the digital age, the insights provided by this panel offer valuable guidance. The discussion points to several areas for future focus, including developing effective measurement frameworks for ESG impact, strategies for overcoming resistance to change, and methods for better integrating ESG considerations into overall business strategies.

The conversation ultimately underscored that while challenges remain, there is significant potential for organisations to drive positive change through well-implemented ESG practices, supported by strong leadership and appropriate technological tools.

Huda lahaideb: The main movement that guarantees the continuity of work and transparency and transforms… Today, the continuity of work, governance and presence, but how do these concepts contribute to strengthening the goals of sustainable development, strengthening digital transformation and achieving sustainability in all its meanings? Ladies and gentlemen, before we dive into the topics of this session, I would like to introduce our distinguished guests, who are a team of experts and technical experts who will lead this discussion. With us is Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir, Director of Governance at one of the leading companies, a coach and consultant in the Board of Directors. Our second guest, Eid, a member of the board of directors, who has been in the field of GRT for 20 years. Our third guest, Mr. Abdulrrahman Al-Majid, a member of the board of directors of the Association of the Board of Artificial Intelligence, who has been in the field of internal and global competition for 20 years. Welcome. Ladies and gentlemen, let’s start with our first topic, which we will discuss, God willing, the concepts of sustainability, the digital transformation standards, environmental standards, and governance, or what is called AHG. Let’s start with Dr. Zahra.

Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir: Thank you, Huda.

Huda lahaideb: Dr. Zahra, from your experience, what is the concept of sustainability?

Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir: Of course, I am talking about the concept of sustainability in its simplest definition from the United Nations. How do we meet the current needs today without touching the needs or potential of the coming generations to meet their needs? How do we study these dimensions? Environmental dimensions, economic dimensions, social dimensions, and also governance dimensions in general. When we talk about the environmental dimension, we all know the natural resources, water and air. How is the social dimension that has quality of life and social justice? As for the economic dimension, it is not the economic dimension in general. Today, ESG has become a trend. Why did we start with ESG? Many people do not know or have never talked about ESG. Why did we start with the environment? Because the environment is the nature we live in, and then the society we work in, and then we need to clean it. This is briefly about sustainability, but today there are many definitions of sustainability available according to the strategy of the system or the direction of the system in general. We need it. We just need these four dimensions that I talked about.

Huda lahaideb: Thank you. Maybe the concept of sustainability and ESG is new and has become a trend in many organizations today. If you tell us, Engineer Khaled, what is the difference today between sustainability, environmental standards, social and governance?

Mohandad Khaled: In the name of God, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. First of all, I would like to thank Ms. Hoda for this introduction. Thank you, Mr. Marraqati, for inviting me to this area and to meet you. It is an important question, the concept of sustainability and the concept of ESG. Thank you. It refers to meeting the current needs without touching the ability of the coming generations to meet their needs. Sustainability aims to create long-term balance in terms of the environment, health, and social justice. Sustainability can be measured through various pillars and indicators in terms of the goals of sustainability and the development of the United Nations. As for environmental, social, governance and ESG practices, they are a set of measurable standards that investors and business owners use to evaluate the performance of the organization through three main areas, which are the environment, society, and the environment. It aims to create an organized framework to evaluate risks and opportunities, such as the environmental impacts, for example, the human rights violations, their moral leadership, and then integrate them into the strategies of the organization. ESG can be measured through standards and indicators provided by various agencies based on the ESG standards and practices. Finally, sustainability and ESG share a common goal in terms of enhancing responsible practices and reducing environmental impacts on the environment and society. However, both work at different levels and serve various purposes. Both concepts are important for investors, contributors, and business owners. Likewise, both concepts are important for organizations that work to enhance responsible practices in terms of sustainability, practices, and investments.

Huda lahaideb: Thank you.

Abdulrahman Al-Majed: Transcribed by ESG Translations This will help us a lot in the process of strengthening the process of decision-making, the sharing of interests, and at the same time, strengthening the issue of accountability and responsibility. Today, if we have reached this stage, and we have been able to define it well, we will be ready today, because today, Islam, in one way or another, is linked to international entities. So, the ruling will be ready, with all certainty, in one way or another, to link this sentence. And this sentence may be the closure of the circle between stability and standards in general.

Huda lahaideb: Very nice. May Allah bless you. And allow me to move on to our third topic, which is the ruling and its effect on peaceful development.

Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir: Dr. Hussain, you gave guidance to this question, especially on the secrets of effective governance. Because, in general, stability, in order to be a part of any organization, must be the first thing in its strategy. Secondly, as a leader in the organization, you must talk about stability. After that, we will talk about clear policies. Before all this, because if we look at today’s governance in Saudi Arabia, when did it become a trend? After Prince Mohammed bin Salman spoke about it. And all his words, at the beginning of the day, became a trend in all sectors. So, today, one of the secrets of governance and stability, in order to be an integral part of the organization and the system, is the strategic stability. The language of the leader that prevails over all existing administrations. The third thing is to have clear policies to monitor its effectiveness at the level of these administrations. After that, we can talk about ESG and the sharing of interests. Today, the distributor, the bank, the government, all of them are an integral part of the system that is stable in all kinds of organizations. Regardless of the sector itself. Because today, honestly, stability suffers with us in its beginnings, like governance in its beginnings. To this day, they give it a label that it is more politics, more political. No, but it has another dimension. We must learn and speak from the beginning to be from the language of the leader in this system.

Huda lahaideb: Thank you very much, Ms. Zahra. Maybe the existence of legislations and systems today has become a necessary and decisive factor for any organization. My question is for Engineer Khaled. How do these systems and legislations affect the governance of environmental and social practices?

Mohandad Khaled: In fact, these systems and legislations affect the governance of environmental and social practices. Through the implementation of standards that must be adhered to by the organizations. It guarantees transparency and consistency in the integration of these standards in business and commercial operations. For example, in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the direction of environmental, social and governance practices is formed through the vision of 2030. It does not require government organizations and companies to deal with initiatives, programs and programs of national stability. For example, the Green Saudi Initiative. At the international level, a number of voluntary institutions are formed. For example, the Institute for the Preparation of Global Reports, GRI, and the Council of Standards for Sustainability, SASS. These are the most famous standards in the field of sustainability. There are also international standards for the preparation of financial reports, such as the IFRS. Among them, the S-1 standard and the S-2 standard will have a great impact on companies in the coming years. Also, there are mandatory standards, including the European standards for the preparation of reports on sustainability. These are mandatory standards that will have a great impact on European companies. The goal of these systems, laws and standards is to unify ESG reports, enhance transparency and sustainable development through industries. Finally, staying up to date on systems and regulations ensures systematic commitment and strengthens credibility. It also strengthens the concept of competition governance, which allows organizations to deal with challenges strategically, while building trust with contributors, clients and business owners.

Huda lahaideb: Thank you very much.

Abdulrahman Al-Majed: This is a very important question. I will continue what my colleagues have said about implementing practices. Today, I believe that one of the pillars of success in implementing this standard or this practice is the strategic direction in higher management. Today, how do we ensure that higher management reflects these roles in one way or another at all levels of management in organizations? Today, we know that some organizations have regular meetings. There are four or five meetings a year. How do we, as a board or as a higher management, ensure that all these practices are implemented in one way or another? This is done through some policies that are ensured through practices such as higher management. At the same time, we ensure that we have an environment or a culture that has been established and established within the organization to adopt these practices. Also, the integration of these goals with the organization’s directions so that we can ensure that these practices are implemented. One of the most important tools that members of the board or higher management use is consistent performance reports or sustainability reports. This is very important. Today, we find that, as Engineer Khadr and Dr. Zahra have pointed out, there is a guidance document that was issued by the Financial Market Authority in cooperation with trade unions to organize the process of dissemination of these practices. It may not be necessary now, but in the near future, it is expected to be implemented. In the end, we can also talk about the issue of culture. Today, we must have a basic culture that supports this direction so that there is adoption of these technologies and work on it. This is possible in general. God bless you.

Huda lahaideb: God bless you. Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to move on to the third topic. We will talk about risk management in the context of environmental, social, and governance practices.

Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir: Of course, as you know, risk management is the backbone of any organization. Dr. Zahra, what is the relationship between risk management, environmental, social, governance, and the importance of the link between them? Of course, there is a comprehensive relationship between the two administrations. Risk management works on studying environmental and social risks in conjunction with the main specialist, ESG management. Of course, there are many organizations in general in any sector that do not have ESG management. However, ESG management is closely related to these practices. What is important is that it interacts, intersects, and integrates with risk management. From my practical experience, we found that the integration of the two administrations in the process of risk management, because it greatly affects the reputation, The relationship is there as a point of view, but it can be considered as an advanced one in terms of co-existence, to be honest. It needs a lot of high management and cooperation between the two administrations in a practical way. The most important thing is to evaluate the risks.

Huda lahaideb: Thank you for the question. An important question.

Mohandad Khaled: There are a number of ways that the organization can use to evaluate the risks, and then combine them in the framework of the risk management. Perhaps one of the most prominent ways is what is known as the risk map, where the risks are divided into two factors, which are the impact and the possibility. The possibility of the risks related to the ESG depends on a number of factors, such as the organizational environment, industrial directions, and the risk record of the organization. As for the impact on the ESG, it can be financial or non-financial. One of the financial impacts, for example, is the existence of fines and penalties on the organization, the loss of willpower, or the increase in costs. One of the non-financial impacts, for example, is the damage to reputation, legal liability, or the loss of credibility. One of the non-financial impacts is the loss of credibility. The risk assessment is based on the scenario analysis. This analysis is based on assumptions about the future, the impact of ESG, and then the evaluation of these impacts and the study of their impact on the organization’s strategy. Also, one of the methods used in risk assessment is what is known as interviews, either with employees, contractors, investors, and business owners to find out their opinions about the risks associated with ESG. Also, one of the methods used in risk assessment is by evaluating data, whether internal data for the organization or external data. All of these methods help accurately evaluate the risks associated with ESG.

Huda lahaideb: Thank you very much. There are important tools that can be used to manage risks associated with society and governance. Mr. Abdur-Rahman, please tell us about these tools.

Abdulrahman Al-Majed: Thank you. A large number of methods and approaches have been pointed out. There are things that may be specialized. Let’s agree that today there is no need for specialists in risk management. Additional tools are recognized, supported, and enabled so that we can reach decision-making. We have things called environmental impact analysis or assessment, and it is usually used by an environmental expert to be more informed. We also have, in addition to the scenarios mentioned by Mr. Mandis, we have things called life cycle assessment. This is usually at the production lines or products related to things that have nothing to do with the environment in one way or another. All of these, of course, are related in one way or another to the institutional risks and are used as tools to work on evaluating the impact in one way or another. An important part, I think, Mr. Khaled, regarding the use of data today, it is necessary to use the data in a suitable way so that we have a combination of advanced technologies, artificial intelligence, and things related to the impact on these data. This will help us a lot in predicting future risks and at the same time provide us with a suitable and good sustainability in one way or another. We have very successful experiments today. We have projects, God willing, now, if you notice, we have NEOM, we have, for example, some projects that have a relationship, for example, that have an impact in one way or another. We see that they put these considerations or standards in consideration and have become leading experiments and excellent practices. These are some of the tools that can be specialized in one way or another, in addition to the risk approaches.

Huda lahaideb: Thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen, let’s move on to our last topic. We will talk about technological advancement and social responsibility and its impact on environmental, social, and governance heritages. Of course, we agreed that digital transformation has become the nerve of life in any organization. Let’s get to know Dr. Zahra about what are the modern technologies that organizations can adopt to guarantee the sustainability of their business and security, and how can we transform today’s numbers and these innovative technologies to prepare us for a more sustainable world.

Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir: Thank you. Thank you very much. Of course, Abu Abdallah and Abu Abdur-Rahman did not neglect some of these technologies, but in addition to that, even if I had the technologies, I would need an expert to know how to use these technologies. For example, we have artificial intelligence, and today we are advancing it rapidly, and it helps us rapidly in decision-making, machine learning, blockchain, and support chains as well. We have huge data to help us support decisions through expectations and analysis, and this data is available in general, and it can be used to enhance the other technologies, but we need an expert to help us read this whole system. This artificial intelligence does not work as you know. Today, the private sector in particular has many of these technologies that help them in the process of sustainability and work with consultants and entrepreneurs in these other countries. Honestly, I see the private sector in general today, and it is currently making great progress.

Huda lahaideb: Thank you very much. Social responsibility may have become an important issue in the development of human life. My question is for Engineer Khaled. What are the social responsibility programs that organizations can adopt in line with the goals of the SG?

Mohandad Khaled: Thank you for the question. It is an important question. In fact, there are many social responsibility programs that organizations can adopt to improve the lives of individuals in society. Maybe I will give some examples, and for example, organizations can adopt social partnerships with non-profit organizations in order to re-use computers and tablets with a small group of people. Also, programs and initiatives that aim to raise the educational level among members of society through training courses or educational grants for members of society. There are also initiatives to support small and medium-sized organizations. Maybe we will mention here, for example, a program that is presented by Aramco, where this program aims to strengthen the small and medium-sized organizations by allocating a portion of the purchases to local organizations. We are also working on the development of green cover and the fight against desertification, such as planting trees in desert areas. Also, organizations can adopt initiatives to transform diesel generators into renewable energy sources in order to reduce carbon emissions. These are just a few examples of such initiatives. I think there are many initiatives and various programs. Also, there are various ideas that can be transformed into programs and social initiatives that contribute to achieving the goals of sustainable development. I just want to add a point here.

Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir: Thank God, we have advanced sectors in Saudi Arabia. In the past, before the term ESG came out, whether in donations or institutional support or charitable support, we may be starting with the environmental part today, but in terms of other things, we are advanced. So, we have advanced in the past, but today there is a development and a competition between companies.

Huda lahaideb: Thank you very much. We know the importance of integrating environmental, social and governance assets with digital transformation strategies, and it is natural that this integration creates challenges. My last question is for Mr. Abdurrahman. What are the main challenges and how can we overcome them?

Abdulrahman Al-Majed: Thank you very much. I would like to start with the challenges related to what Dr. Zahra said. About a week ago, we had the COP16 conference, which is the largest conference in terms of what Dr. Zahra said. Today, there is a lot of movement on this side, and we see that there is a suitable response. How do you see the general strategy for innovation related to this side? I hope that we will see a bright future. I return to the question of Mr. Huda regarding the challenges. In my opinion, today I see that resistance is the biggest factor and the biggest challenge facing any organization or any side striving for change, and not accepting change and rejecting it. This is perhaps the biggest challenge. And this, of course, dealing with it has become a certain methodology and methods in order to facilitate the process of change, including, for example, the individual, the institutional culture in the organization in general, and at the same time, the process of incentivizing in one way or another to adopt such practices. We also have, as Dr. Zahra said, the subject of technologies. Today, one of the most important challenges is the absence of mature and suitable data to use in order to build decisions on it. Also, perhaps, before the workshop, there was a conversation with your team, and the team, God willing, was the director of the world of governance. Today, we were talking about the subject of governance and measurement, and how to implement measurements, and how to implement all these topics. Today, if the measurements are not present, and there is no clear measurement machine to determine the maturity level in it, it will be very difficult to use it. These are perhaps the most important challenges that may face the process of adoption. God bless you.

Huda lahaideb: God bless you. Mohandad Khaled, Dr. Zahra, if you have any additions before we conclude the session.

Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir: My last addition with the challenge that I preferred in Coop60, I personally downloaded it, and it was very great, and I am looking forward to the coming days, and all the things, execution and implementations. But from the challenge also, maybe Abu Abdullah, that the resistance, they talk a lot about sustainability, but I notice from some leaders, some, the leaders have resistance to sustainability, they do not believe in it until now, as a part of the process, or the language of implementation and execution. You must believe in it, so that we can see and touch it on the ground soon.

Huda lahaideb: Very nice, Mohandad Khaled.

Mohandad Khaled: I would like to add one of the important challenges in this subject. Of course, environmental practices are an issue that has arisen in recent years. The main challenge is the resistance to change. It is natural that we find many organizations, especially private organizations, or family companies, even if they are large companies, may be in resistance to this change. Perhaps, looking at the importance and role of these practices, and raising awareness in them will reduce the resistance to change, and also the existence of governmental standards to evaluate these practices will help and make a competition in the implementation of these practices, God willing.

Huda lahaideb: Very nice, God bless you. Of course, in the end, I would like to thank you for your presence and your time, and I would also like to thank our distinguished guests with us today, Dr. Zahra, Mohandad Khaled, Mr. Abdur Rahman, for hosting this session with your warm speeches and discussions, and your valuable experiences. So, thank you very much, and we are moving towards a sustainable digital future. Thank you very much. Thank you. God bless you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Agreement Points

Importance of sustainability and ESG practices

speakers

Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir

Mohandad Khaled

Abdulrahman Al-Majed

arguments

Sustainability meets current needs without compromising future generations

ESG practices are measurable standards for evaluating organizational performance

summary

All speakers agreed on the significance of sustainability and ESG practices in modern organizations, emphasizing their role in meeting present needs while considering future impacts.

Challenges in implementing ESG practices

speakers

Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir

Mohandad Khaled

Abdulrahman Al-Majed

arguments

Resistance to change is a major challenge in implementing ESG practices

summary

The speakers concurred that resistance to change, particularly from leadership, is a significant obstacle in implementing ESG practices within organizations.

Role of technology in enhancing sustainability efforts

speakers

Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir

Abdulrahman Al-Majed

arguments

AI, blockchain and big data can enhance sustainability efforts

Specialized tools like environmental impact analysis support risk management

summary

The speakers agreed on the importance of leveraging modern technologies and specialized tools to support sustainability efforts and risk management in the context of ESG.

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers emphasized the importance of clear policies, legislations, and systems in effectively implementing and governing ESG practices within organizations.

speakers

Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir

Mohandad Khaled

arguments

Effective governance requires strategic stability and clear policies

Legislations and systems affect governance of environmental and social practices

Both speakers highlighted the close relationship between risk management and ESG practices, discussing various methods for evaluating and managing ESG-related risks.

speakers

Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir

Mohandad Khaled

arguments

Risk management is closely related to ESG practices

Organizations can use risk maps and scenario analysis to evaluate ESG risks

Unexpected Consensus

Progress in social responsibility initiatives

speakers

Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir

Mohandad Khaled

arguments

Organizations can adopt various social responsibility programs aligned with ESG goals

explanation

Despite focusing on different aspects of ESG, both speakers unexpectedly agreed on the advanced state of social responsibility initiatives in Saudi Arabia, noting that many programs were in place even before the term ESG became popular.

Overall Assessment

Summary

The speakers demonstrated a high level of agreement on the importance of sustainability and ESG practices, the challenges in implementation, and the role of technology in supporting these efforts. They also shared similar views on the relationship between governance, risk management, and ESG practices.

Consensus level

The level of consensus among the speakers was notably high, with agreement on core concepts and challenges. This strong consensus implies a shared understanding of the importance of ESG practices and the need for continued efforts in implementation and overcoming resistance to change in organizations.

Different Viewpoints

Unexpected Differences

Overall Assessment

summary

The speakers demonstrated a high level of agreement on the main topics discussed, including the concepts of sustainability and ESG, the importance of governance and risk management, and the role of technology in supporting these efforts.

difference_level

The level of disagreement among the speakers was minimal to non-existent. This high level of agreement suggests a shared understanding of the importance of sustainability and ESG practices in modern organizations. It also implies that there is a growing consensus on the need for integrating these practices into business strategies and operations. The lack of disagreement may indicate that the field of sustainability and ESG is becoming more established, with common frameworks and understandings emerging across different sectors and expertise areas.

Partial Agreements

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers emphasized the importance of clear policies, legislations, and systems in effectively implementing and governing ESG practices within organizations.

speakers

Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir

Mohandad Khaled

arguments

Effective governance requires strategic stability and clear policies

Legislations and systems affect governance of environmental and social practices

Both speakers highlighted the close relationship between risk management and ESG practices, discussing various methods for evaluating and managing ESG-related risks.

speakers

Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir

Mohandad Khaled

arguments

Risk management is closely related to ESG practices

Organizations can use risk maps and scenario analysis to evaluate ESG risks

Key Takeaways

Sustainability aims to meet current needs without compromising future generations’ ability to meet their needs

ESG (Environmental, Social, Governance) practices are measurable standards for evaluating organizational performance

Effective governance requires strategic stability, clear policies, and leadership commitment

Risk management is closely intertwined with ESG practices and crucial for organizational success

Technology like AI, blockchain, and big data can enhance sustainability efforts

Social responsibility programs aligned with ESG goals can improve community life

Resistance to change is a major challenge in implementing ESG practices

Resolutions and Action Items

Organizations should integrate ESG considerations into their strategies and operations

Companies need to adopt appropriate technologies and tools to support ESG implementation

There’s a need to raise awareness about the importance of ESG practices to reduce resistance to change

Unresolved Issues

How to effectively measure and quantify the impact of ESG practices

How to address the lack of mature data for decision-making in ESG implementation

How to overcome leadership resistance to sustainability initiatives in some organizations

Suggested Compromises

None identified

Today, ESG has become a trend. Why did we start with ESG? Many people do not know or have never talked about ESG. Why did we start with the environment? Because the environment is the nature we live in, and then the society we work in, and then we need to clean it.

speaker

Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir

reason

This comment provides insight into the prioritization and rationale behind ESG initiatives, explaining why environmental concerns often take precedence.

impact

It set the tone for discussing ESG as an integrated concept and prompted further exploration of its components throughout the conversation.

Sustainability and ESG share a common goal in terms of enhancing responsible practices and reducing environmental impacts on the environment and society. However, both work at different levels and serve various purposes.

speaker

Mohandad Khaled

reason

This comment clarifies the relationship between sustainability and ESG, highlighting their similarities and differences.

impact

It helped differentiate between these often conflated concepts, leading to a more nuanced discussion of their roles in organizational practices.

Today, one of the secrets of governance and stability, in order to be an integral part of the organization and the system, is the strategic stability. The language of the leader that prevails over all existing administrations.

speaker

Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir

reason

This insight emphasizes the crucial role of leadership in implementing ESG and sustainability practices.

impact

It shifted the conversation towards the importance of top-down commitment in driving organizational change related to ESG and sustainability.

Today, we must have a basic culture that supports this direction so that there is adoption of these technologies and work on it.

speaker

Abdulrahman Al-Majed

reason

This comment highlights the importance of organizational culture in successfully implementing ESG practices.

impact

It broadened the discussion to include cultural aspects of ESG implementation, beyond just policies and technologies.

We have things called environmental impact analysis or assessment, and it is usually used by an environmental expert to be more informed. We also have, in addition to the scenarios mentioned by Mr. Mandis, we have things called life cycle assessment.

speaker

Abdulrahman Al-Majed

reason

This comment introduces specific tools and methodologies used in ESG risk assessment, providing practical insights.

impact

It moved the conversation from theoretical concepts to practical applications, enriching the discussion with concrete examples of ESG implementation.

Overall Assessment

These key comments shaped the discussion by progressively deepening the understanding of ESG and sustainability concepts. They moved the conversation from defining basic terms to exploring practical implementation challenges, the role of leadership and organizational culture, and specific tools used in ESG practices. The discussion evolved from a general overview to a more nuanced exploration of how ESG principles are applied in real-world organizational contexts.

How can organizations effectively implement and measure the impact of ESG practices?

speaker

Abdulrahman Al-Majed

explanation

This was implied when discussing the challenges of implementing ESG practices, particularly the need for clear measurement mechanisms to determine maturity levels in organizations.

What strategies can be employed to overcome resistance to change in implementing sustainability and ESG practices?

speaker

Abdulrahman Al-Majed and Mohandad Khaled

explanation

Both speakers identified resistance to change as a major challenge in adopting ESG practices, suggesting the need for further exploration of effective strategies to address this issue.

How can organizations better integrate ESG considerations into their risk management processes?

speaker

Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir

explanation

Dr. Zahra mentioned the need for better integration between ESG management and risk management, indicating an area for further research on practical integration methods.

What are the most effective ways to use artificial intelligence and big data in supporting ESG decision-making and risk assessment?

speaker

Abdulrahman Al-Majed and Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir

explanation

Both speakers mentioned the potential of AI and big data in ESG practices, suggesting a need for further research on practical applications and best practices.

How can organizations develop a culture that supports and embraces ESG practices?

speaker

Abdulrahman Al-Majed

explanation

This was mentioned as an important factor in successfully implementing ESG practices, indicating a need for further research on cultural change strategies.

What are the implications of upcoming mandatory ESG reporting standards, such as those in Europe, for global organizations?

speaker

Mohandad Khaled

explanation

The speaker mentioned new mandatory standards, suggesting a need for further research on their global impact and how organizations can prepare.

How can organizations effectively balance the environmental, social, and governance aspects of ESG in their strategies and operations?

speaker

Dr. Zahra Al-Nasir

explanation

The discussion touched on the different aspects of ESG, implying a need for research on how to effectively balance and integrate all three components.

Summary

This discussion focused on the challenges and opportunities for women and girls in internet governance and digital technology, particularly in Africa. Participants highlighted the significant gender digital divide, with statistics showing lower internet connectivity rates for women compared to men in Africa. Key barriers identified included affordability, lack of digital skills, cultural obstacles, and issues with digital identity.

Several initiatives to address these challenges were discussed. The UN Economic Commission for Africa is running programs like the Africa Girl Recording Camp to provide digital skills training to young women. The Internet Society and its Foundation are working on improving access, digital literacy, and safety for women online. Organizations like GirlHype are focused on bridging the digital divide through coding classes and infrastructure improvements in underserved areas.

Participants emphasized the importance of including women in policymaking and internet governance processes to ensure their perspectives are represented. The need for gender-responsive policies and mentorship programs was highlighted. Speakers also noted the economic benefits of closing the gender digital divide, including potential GDP growth and job creation.

The discussion concluded with a call for collective action across sectors and borders to dismantle barriers holding women back in the digital space. Participants stressed the urgency of addressing these issues to ensure women are not left behind as digital transformation accelerates globally.

Keypoints

Major discussion points:

– The gender digital divide, particularly in Africa, with statistics showing lower internet access and connectivity for women compared to men

– Barriers facing women in accessing digital technologies, including affordability, digital skills gaps, cultural barriers, and lack of digital identity

– Initiatives and programs aimed at increasing women’s digital skills and participation, such as training programs and entrepreneurship support

– Policy recommendations to address the gender digital divide, including improving access, digital literacy, online safety, and representation in decision-making

– The importance of infrastructure development to enable women’s digital participation, especially in rural areas

Overall purpose:

The goal of this discussion was to examine the challenges facing women and girls in accessing and benefiting from digital technologies, particularly in Africa, and to explore solutions and initiatives to increase women’s participation in internet governance and the digital economy.

Tone:

The tone was primarily serious and focused, with speakers presenting statistics and discussing challenges. However, there were also notes of optimism and determination, particularly when discussing initiatives and potential solutions. The tone became more personal and emotional towards the end, with expressions of gratitude and commitment to the cause.

Speakers

– Anja Gengo: IGF Secretariat representative

– Sarah Armstrong: Speaking on behalf of the Internet Society and Internet Society Foundation

– Baratang Miya: Founder of GirlHype, organizer of Women Internet Governance Forum summit

– Mactar Seck: Senior Economic Affairs Officer at the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA)

Additional speakers:

– Toko Miya: CEO of GirlHype (speech read by Baratang Miya)

The discussion focused on the challenges and opportunities for women and girls in internet governance and digital technology, with a particular emphasis on Africa. Participants from various organisations, including the IGF Secretariat, Internet Society, GirlHype, and the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), contributed their insights and experiences.

Gender Digital Divide in Africa

A significant gender digital divide was highlighted as a primary concern, particularly in Africa. Mactar Seck from UNECA provided striking statistics, noting that while women constitute 50.5% of Africa’s population, only 30% of women are connected to the internet compared to 44% of men. This disparity underscores the urgent need to address barriers to women’s digital inclusion.

The speakers identified several key obstacles:

1. Affordability: The cost of mobile phones and internet access remains prohibitively high for many women in Africa.

2. Digital Skills Gap: There is a significant lack of digital literacy and skills among women, hindering their ability to fully participate in the digital economy.

3. Infrastructure: Inadequate digital infrastructure, especially in rural areas, limits women’s access to the internet and digital technologies.

4. Cultural Barriers: Societal norms and expectations can impact women’s confidence and approach to technology from an early age.

5. Digital Identity: Mactar Seck highlighted that out of 400 million people in Africa without any legal form of identity, 60% are women, further limiting their access to various services.

Baratang Miya, founder of GirlHype, introduced Toko Miya, the current CEO of GirlHype, who provided more specific insights into the challenges faced by women in Africa. These included limited access to devices, high data costs, and inadequate infrastructure, particularly in rural areas. Baratang also shared a personal observation about the difference in approach between boys and girls when faced with technical challenges, noting that girls often hesitate due to societal expectations.

Economic Impact of Women’s Digital Inclusion

The speakers unanimously agreed on the substantial economic benefits of closing the gender digital divide. Mactar Seck emphasised that excluding women from digital access results in significant GDP losses. Sarah Armstrong, speaking on behalf of Sally Wentworth, the CEO of the Internet Society who was unable to attend, reinforced this point, stating that women’s digital participation can boost economies and drive innovation.

Baratang Miya stressed the need to empower women entrepreneurs in digital markets. Sarah Armstrong further highlighted social enterprises as a promising opportunity for women’s economic participation, citing a recent report that social enterprises created 200 million jobs in the current year.

Initiatives to Promote Women’s Digital Inclusion

The discussion showcased various initiatives aimed at increasing women’s digital skills and participation:

1. UNECA’s Africa Girl Recording Camp: This programme targets women and girls aged 12 to 25, providing digital skills training in robotics, AI, 3D printing, and coding. UNECA has also established a center for AI research in Brazzaville, Congo, and a STEAM center in Rwanda.

2. Internet Society and Foundation: They offer grants and training programmes focused on improving access, digital literacy, and online safety for women.

3. GirlHype: The organisation works on digital literacy and infrastructure improvements in schools, particularly targeting underserved areas. Baratang Miya shared an example of implementing a coding program in a rural school in Limpopo, South Africa, highlighting the infrastructure challenges they faced.

4. IGF Women’s Summit: Anja Gengo from the IGF Secretariat mentioned this initiative to increase women’s engagement in internet governance discussions.

5. Zatna: Baratang Miya mentioned Zatna’s contribution to cybersecurity skills training for girls.

Policy and Representation

The speakers agreed on the critical importance of including women’s perspectives in internet governance and policymaking. They noted that women are currently underrepresented in these roles, which perpetuates structural barriers to women’s digital participation. Baratang Miya emphasised the need for gender-responsive policies in digital transformation.

Mactar Seck highlighted the Global Digital Compact objectives, which focus on inclusion and closing the digital divide. The speakers concurred that implementing these objectives could significantly contribute to addressing the gender digital divide.

Challenges and Future Directions

Several unresolved issues were identified, including:

1. Addressing cultural barriers limiting women’s digital participation in some regions

2. Developing specific strategies to make digital devices and internet access more affordable for women

3. Increasing funding and support for women entrepreneurs in digital markets

4. Improving online safety and reducing cyberbullying/harassment of women

The discussion concluded with a call for collective action across sectors and borders to dismantle barriers holding women back in the digital space. Participants stressed the urgency of addressing these issues to ensure women are not left behind as digital transformation accelerates globally.

Anja Gengo closed the session by mentioning an upcoming discussion on women and girls in Afghanistan who lack basic rights to education, highlighting the broader context of gender inequality issues. Baratang Miya expressed gratitude to Anja Gengo for her commitment to the Women in IGF Summit.

In summary, the discussion provided a comprehensive overview of the challenges facing women in the digital space, particularly in Africa, from basic access and identity issues to skills development and representation in governance. It highlighted the economic imperative of closing the gender digital divide and showcased various initiatives aimed at empowering women in the digital economy. The strong consensus among speakers on key issues suggests a clear recognition of the challenges and potential solutions, which could facilitate coordinated efforts and policy development in this critical area.

Anja Gengo: Baratang for years on better engagement and inclusion of girls and women in in the IGF and addressing of those topics and I’m glad that as a result of that collaboration is the Women’s Summit. So very shortly I hope we will hear from of course Baratang Mia as well as from Elisabeth Kalitsirom-Walle as our co- moderators and then I hope that with Toko the audio issues will be resolved. Toko is the CEO of Girl Hype Women Who Code. We’re very lucky here to have a person that has been a great I think focal point for global engagement in internet governance given that the ECA was the secretariat for a very successful African IGF just several weeks ago. So we’re here from Makhtar Sekh, Senior Economic Affairs Officer at the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa. After that we’ll hear from Horace Chimpere, founder Herford Tech. Sarah Armstrong is with us from the Internet Society. Zanive Asare will be also joining us, Vice President and Head of Public Policy Africa Yangon. And then most of this session will be reserved for an open dialogue and discussion focusing on how to better engage women and girls in internet governance. What would be very important for this forum to hear is especially from the backgrounds and the communities you are coming from to tell us what are the good practices but also not so good practices with respect to gender equality, overall equity and position generally speaking of women and girls in the digital environment. So without further ado I would like to ask our technicians can we try again to see if we can hear Toco speaking. I’ll just give a minute. Toko, maybe you can try to unmute yourself. I think we’re still experiencing technical issues, so if we don’t mind, perhaps we can start from what we have here in the room. So Maktar, I won’t put you on the spot at the beginning, but I know you’re also a great advocate for gender equality, women inclusion, and speaking always a lot about the importance of having women and girls with active role and equal role in these processes on Internet governance, which is not our reality. So from your perspective and from the perspective of the ECA, can you share maybe about what are your observations, what is your work about, what do you see now, what do you think the global community should focus on to ensure that gender digital divide is finally closed?

Mactar Seck: Thank you, Tanja, for this opening session. I think it’s very important when you want to take the opportunity of the digital economy to take into consideration the role of women and girls in this digital space. Why? You know in Africa we have 50.5% of the population are women, and when you look at this access to Internet, we have 30% of women connected to Internet, 31% connected compared to 44% men. The gap is high. And we have seen also since the… From 2023 up to 2024, we have a decrease of the women connected to the internet. When you look at the global connectivity in Africa, in 2023 we were at 37%. And October 2014-2024, we are at 38%. We have an increase of 1% of the connectivity from 2023-2024. And in the meantime, we have the gap between men and women increase, because the gap now is at 30%, 1.3%, compared to 10% before. Why? We have several reasons for that. First, there is an issue of affordability for women in Africa to own their mobile phone. We have also the digital skills barrier, language barrier for several women in the continent. We have also cultural barrier in the continent. And also the issue of digital identity. In Africa, we have almost 400 million, more than 400 million without any legal form of identity. And among the 400 million, 60% are women. And this 60% doesn’t have any access to any service. Land service, social service, administration service, higher education service, because they don’t have a legal identity. It is a problem. Why we at the UNECA, we try to find a solution by several initiatives. It is one. IGF, it is a good… forum to discuss on this idea and I think since we have IGF we have seen a lot of progress in the connectivity among the women because we start very low when we have an IGF of 2.6 percent and now we have a 30 something percent. This is something big progress on access to women and also what we need also to provide access to women because it is an issue of development. In developing countries excluding women on access of digital will provide a loss of 1.5 trillion dollars on the GDP. It’s a lot and the government should understand they need to provide access to the women and girls in this digital era. At ICA we have several programs. We have one program called Africa Girl Recording Camp. What is this program? This program targets women and girls aged from 12 to 25 years to give them digital skills on the robotic, on AI, on what call it on 3D printing, on coding. How can they use a technology to resolve their problem and this program was launched in 2022 and around 40,000 girls participate in this program, get this training. 308 projects have been developed by young girls and these projects are very innovative because you know technology is not something you need. You have to learn at the beginning. Some girl doesn’t have any knowledge skills in technology when they join the program and after two weeks they come up with a key project initiative. They know how to code, how to use a 3D printing. how to develop application on AI. And this is something showing Africa can play, women in Africa can play a key role in this for industrial revolution. Also, another program, it is to build the skill of the women entrepreneurship. We have one program with Alibaba on FinTech. We call this program Africa Women Tech. How to build the capacity of women in the technology side, the entrepreneur women in the technology side. And this program now is issued to five country. And the objective is by 2026 to reach all African country. I think there are a lot of things. Also, on the financial inclusion, we have seen a lot of progress on women to access to the bank account. But there is still some gap where we have to sort it out quickly. If you want to reach the sustainable development goal. When we talk about sustainable development goal, we already adopted, I think, two months ago in September, this Global Digital Compact. And the Global Digital Compact has five objective. And two objective, all objective are focused on women. Because when we talk about connectivity, objective one, it is to close this digital divide. Digital divide means gender digital divide also. When we talk about objective two on inclusion and the benefits of digital technology for all, women are an important role to play. Because we need to increase everybody in this digital information society. And as you know, Africa has to create around 625 million job by 2030. And all this job need a technology component. And women have a lot of opportunity to be part on this job create. When we talk about security. on objective 3. Security is important because you know we have a some issue in Africa we have a lot of lady now on the digital space and they are victim from this cyber crime and they don’t want to say it yeah it is a problem a lot of people a lot of lady woman get attack on internet but they don’t talk about this for cultural barrier and we need also to do to bridges is a cultural barrier for people to protect them on this internet on the internet on this information society also to give them more confidence to talk about their problem facing in this digital technology when you talk about this data sharing also a very important objective for of the global digital compact data sharing woman also as our big role there because you know almost to we have a 30% connected man woman 43 men but the issue is when we go to social media in Facebook it is a 50-50 a 50% of the woman connected to be in social media and they share a lot of information we need to educate them what kind of information you have to share in Facebook hmm what kind of information you have to get in in Facebook in the social media for Twitter they are not very active because they are only 3% now but we need also to educated our woman how and they have to share govern their data it’s a very important and the last one it is when we talk about this governance of the artificial intelligence yeah it is very important where we can develop the skill of this woman and we to be key actor we need to create a lot of job for woman and there is a possibility now with this AI technology to create this job in the continent While we have several activities also at the UNECA, one is we already established a center of research of artificial intelligence in Brazzaville, Congo, and this also will help to build the skill, develop the research for women in the continent. And we are establishing now a STEAM center in Rwanda for the women also in the early stage now can start developing their skills on digital. To protect them, we are also working with the government of Congo to build this African center of cyber security to protect all the African citizens in this digital era. It is some key element I would like to highlight today, and we have as an initiative, and thank you very much for inviting UNECA here, and we also commend the work you have done at the IGF Secretariat because since 2005, a lot has been done, and we have seen your motivation, your dynamism in the continent, and we organized a successful IGF in Ethiopia two years ago, and I think it is a testimony that the IGF Secretariat is doing very well, and congratulations for all the work done. Thank you very much.

Anja Gengo: Well, thank you very much, Makhtar. First of all, I want to thank you for setting the framework for this discussion. You’ve shared some very important numbers and statistics, some alarming numbers, but also some on a more positive note that we are making a change, especially in the past 20 years. I’m also happy to hear that you’re putting us in a framework of what could be the next advancement for all of us, which is the implementation of the recently agreed Global Digital Compact at the level… of the member states. I hope that we can expand that into a very important momentum we are now, which are the preparations for the 20 years review of the World Summit on the Information Society, where the concept of gender equality online and closing gender-based digital divide is also central and really cross-cuts the action lines. So I hope we will hear also about that part and I’m very, very happy that the person who gathered us all here finally made it. So welcome Baratang. I’m sure we are, you see, we are meeting one challenge at a time. We have Baratang now here. I’m sure soon we will have colleagues online joining us by audio here in this room because unfortunately still we cannot hear them. Baratang, I will now give the floor back to you As our moderator and the chair, we’ve heard some very important statements from Maktar, something that you know by heart because you are living this topic, first of all, through your work, but also through just your work with the community and continuous engagement. And I want to congratulate you on organizing traditionally this session. This is what I said at the beginning, where we all come, as I said, really with great honor, but also with great responsibility given the topic and the fact that we are still leaving behind many women and girls while the technology is rapidly going forward. So we’ve heard from Maktar. I spoke quite a lot, but we also have Sarah here, so I will give back the floor to you. Okay.

Baratang Miya: Thank you, Anja. I have to say I can always count on Maktar and Anja. I’m very sorry for being late and last night I had a call with Maktar about the session and he said to me, Baratang, don’t be late. And as the universe heard it, I was late. I’m so sorry. Your excellencies, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen, it is my honor again to welcome you to the Women Internet Governance Forum. summit here in Riyadah. This is our third session. I think Magda spoke about it. And this session is only successful because UNECA and UN Secretariat is really committed to it. When I say commitment, I mean they make sure that they fund the women to come to the session. They make sure that I get all the support I need to get speakers, to get people to sit on board. And the youth, some of the women that were youth, have now moved up and are now speakers on our panel, which is very good. So I must say your support is a testament to your commitment, Anya. I remember when I discussed the session with you earlier on that you said, I’m committed to helping you. And it’s really been three years of doing that. And it’s something that I’m really proud of. And Magda, your commitment to promoting diversity and inclusion of women in this space is something I value. And it goes further than this, because I work with you in Africa, and I see what you are doing for digital public infrastructure and for everything. And Sarah, I know we contacted you last minute, and you made sure you sit here. And that shows a commitment to the ecosystem that people want to change, and women can be on the leadership. I’m not going to take long, because I want more speaking. But for me, it’s your kindness and generosity is always appreciated as people who are here. But I always think of what Malala Yousaf once said. He said, one child, one teacher, one book, one plan can change the world. It is a very simple statement. But if you think about it, for us as women, that’s what we live with daily. It might be a seat on the table on the Internet Governance Forum, but we need more women. And the other thing that I take with is what the Secretary General said at the GDC summit, he said no one should be left behind. Now we are going to leave lots of people behind unless we have women on a seat, unless we have women contributing on policy writing. So putting together a panel was meant to make sure that today, as we are sitting here, we have those connections of one woman, one connection, one idea that can change the internet governance landscape and make sure that we are creating a brighter future and that’s inclusive for women. Thank you. I don’t know where to take because you spoke a lot. Okay, and I’ll give back, hand over to Sarah.

Sarah Armstrong: Hello, now? Okay, good. Good morning and good afternoon or good evening to anyone joining us online. My name is Sarah Armstrong and I’m speaking on behalf of the Internet Society as well as the Internet Society Foundation. We are two different organizations. The Internet Society Foundation is a supporting organization of the Internet Society. Many people may know us already as ISOC or the ISOC Foundation. So I’m here actually for our CEO, Sally Wentworth. She got delayed, as happens. There are just times where your planes decide they’re not gonna get you where you wanna go when you wanna go there. So under those circumstances, she asked me if I would please join the panel and I am very happy to do so, but she does send her regards. So I’d like to speak a little bit also on more statistics to build on my colleague here and talk about the problem, but also, obviously, talk about some of the solutions. And I’d like to speak specifically in addition. to the solutions of the Internet Society and the Internet Society Foundation have to addressing this issue, to speak about a direction forward. So, I want to start by sharing our vision statement. The vision statement for the Internet Society and the Internet Society Foundation is, the Internet is for everyone. Well, yes, for everyone, but we have a long way to go. It’s especially an issue with women, as we know, and we’ve heard already. I don’t have to tell you that there are so many more men right now than women who are involved in the Internet in all kinds of ways, and we’re really trying to change that. It’s really holding back society to not have the women as involved as they could or should be. So, as we’ve heard, there are more men than women on the Internet, and this is particularly prominent in low-income countries. So, that’s a target for a lot of the work that we do. According to the Women in the Digital Economy, which some people may know as YDEF, ensuring women can fully participate in the global digital economy, entire economies will benefit in terms of a higher GDP, stronger workforce, and higher levels of innovation. So, there’s a real reason why this is about not just empowering the women, but helping to really add to the value of the community and the things that they all can contribute together. So, we also have a report that says the gender digital divide has a direct and negative effect on global development and inhibits global goals for creating inclusive societies and economies. So, we need to make changes and close this gender digital divide. It’s important. So, as I said, ISOC and the Foundation are both working to do that. In many cases, the work that we’re doing is focusing on training, because that’s so important, is to get women into environments where they can learn skills. We have an example where the Internet Society did a training for women in Mali, and in that case they discovered that these women had never had opportunities to learn to do any sort of work, the real hard skills work of how you create Internets, splice cables, configure a network, all that type of thing. And so we are addressing that through training. And we also have a lot of other programs that do that, and we’re making a real effort to make these programs more inclusive of women and more targeting of women because of what we’re talking about here and the impact that they can make on overall communities, overall economies. In addition, the Foundation, which is an organization that funds other organizations to do this type of work, we have many grants in many countries where our organizations, our partner organizations are really out there doing a lot of training and encouraging women to be involved in providing opportunities otherwise not be available. So I encourage you to look at both the Internet Society and the Internet Society Foundation websites to see all the different programs we have. And what’s interesting with the Foundation, the applications that we’re getting, we’re starting to see more people who want to use their program funding to target women. So this is all really encouraging to see in light of the environment that we’re working in and the environment that I’ve described with some of these statistics. And we also at ISOC and the Foundation are making one of our 2030 goals to bring in an affordable and affordable, resilient, reliable internet, and we want to make sure that we do this with women in mind because we know that women are important for the reasons that I’ve stated to be involved in helping to really augment countries in the digital age. And so we’re really focusing on women for the next five-year strategy that we’ve developed, and this is a strategy that’s both for the Internet Society and the Internet Society Foundation. We are looking specifically at connecting women and focusing on social enterprises. That is an area that we feel is important. It’s a real sustainable effort, or excuse me, anchor for the community, and according to the 2024 Global Social Enterprises Report, social enterprises created in 2024 200 million jobs. So this is important. It’s a good, important place for us to focus. So those are some of the areas that the Internet Society and the Internet Society Foundation are focused, and those are the statistics and the issues that we are addressing with our focus. And then I’d like to just turn quickly to looking at policy, since when we’re here, we talk a lot about policy recommendations. So again, quoting YDEF, their report, they are recommending to close the gender digital divide that they focus, or we focus, on five different areas. First, improved access to affordable devices and online experiences. Second, increased availability of relevant products and tools. So this goes to all the things that we’ve just heard about. Elevating digital literacy and skills, an area I’ve just spoken more about. enhancing safety and security, and the fifth is generating data and insights. And I think we can all agree that these are important places for us to focus, so not just that women have more opportunities, but that the communities can benefit from the women in their communities and all that they have to offer. So in closing, thank you for your attention. I want to say that still over one-third of the world’s population is not connected, which translates to about 2.6 billion people, and women and girls are the most affected by this situation. So we need to acknowledge this, work together, and meaningfully empower women in the internet governance spaces to bring their perspective to internet governance and to push for change and make this change happen. So there’s a lot of work to do. We’ve started. We’re working very hard and diligently to continue to do this. The organizations to which we provide funds are also doing this. We know that many of you out there are doing this, and we know that we can work together and make a difference. So again, on behalf of Sally Wentworth and myself, Sarah Armstrong, thank you so much for your attention. I look forward to a discussion.

Baratang Miya: Thank you very much for a great speech. I’m used to hearing the mic speaking back, so my brain is looking for that. So I should take this off. I am going to read Togo’s speech. Apparently the people online cannot hear clearly and she can’t get through, so… I’m going to read Toko’s speech. Toko Mia is the CEO of GirlHype, which I founded 23 years ago to close the digital gap for women and girls. When I founded GirlHype, Toko was 11, and she’s been with the organization since then, and now she’s a big woman and running it as the CEO. I’m busy living life. So I’ll read her speech. On behalf of Toko, this is how she wrote it. As we gather in this room, we recognize the vast potential of digital technologies to transform lives, elevate economies, and bridge digital divides. But we also acknowledge the disparities that remains, particularly for women in Africa and access, and across the global South. Sector problems related to women in digital markets and transformation. Number one, limited access to digital infrastructure. And this is a big one for women in Africa, who apparently the people online can hear now. I’m not sure if she can talk. Toko, can you talk? Respond so that I should be able to hand you over. I’m sorry, the people online can hear now. She’s not responding. So number one, limited access to digital infrastructure. I think this is the bigger thing. Once you solve infrastructure, you would have sorted women’s problems. That’s my belief. You sort out one issue, which is digital infrastructure, women will move mountains. Let’s just say that. Women have access to resources. They will make the best of it. They will move table mountain and combine it with signal mountain and make one big thing. That’s why in Africa, there’s a saying that you empower a woman, you’re empowering a village. It doesn’t say you empower a man. It was very specific, written generations ago, that empower one woman, it’s generations. So I truly believe in this. Sorry, now I’m. elaborating on someone else’s speech. I’m going to read it as she wrote it. In many parts of Africa, women face significant barriers to access the internet and digital tools. Rural areas. Can she hear? Can she talk? She’s online. Oh, she can talk. Okay. In many parts of Africa, women face significant barriers to accessing the internet and digital tools. Rural areas in particular are plagued by poor connectivity, high cost, and lack of infrastructure, leaving women disconnected and unable to leverage digital opportunities for education or entrepreneurship. Digital literacy and skills gap. The digital divide is not merely about access, but it’s also about skills needed to use technology effectively. Women often lack the training and confidence to navigate digital platforms, which stem as their participation in e-commerce, remote work, and other digitally driven economic activities. This is where we really need to hone on. And as Gail Hype, I must say, I’m proud to say, ISOC has been supporting us. We have been getting small grants to run programs for digital literacies for women. That’s something that really now we should be focusing on. Skills for women is a big thing, or else we’re leaving them behind. Number three is gender bias in digital markets. Women entrepreneurs in digital markets face systemic challenges, including limited access to funding, discriminatory practices, and lack of gender responsive policies. This prevents women-owned businesses from scaling and thriving in the digital economy. The fourth one is safety and security online. Cyberbullying, harassment, and gender-based violence in online spaces deter women from fully participating in digital markets and governance. robust protections and support exacerbates these challenges. Number five is policy and representation gaps. Women remain underrepresented in policy making spaces where digital transformation strategies are shaped. This leads to perpetuation of structural barriers that disproportionately affects women’s ability to benefit from digital opportunities. And the key barriers of access in Africa for women’s economic participations is that the integration of these challenges mentioned above form significant barriers to women’s economic participation. So if women have no access to the internet, which we now know that the internet is not just the internet, it’s information, data, access, change of life. If women do not have access to those things we’re talking about, they lack affordability. The cost of, it’s cost also by affordability, which is the cost of devices and data remains prohibitive for many women. It causes constraints for them to participate and it discourage the outright participation. Now, as she wrote this, but I understand what she means. The outright participation is very easy. We work with boys and girls. If you put a laptop in front of a boy, there’s nothing wrong with that. 90% of the boys, if it breaks, they call other boys and say, it broke down. We put it in front of girls. If it breaks, they are afraid of coming to me and say, I broke the laptop. They come to me and say, I broke it. And this is a simple thing, that girls want perfection. And it’s the societal norms. Whilst boys are not afraid of breaking it and saying, it’s broken, fix it. And those are little minor things. because as Girl Hype, we do teach boys. Those boys will excel super fast because they are used to playing games. They are, the association from childhood to put them in a tech space is so strong. Girls have that, but not African girls. We shouldn’t just look at girls from first world countries and assume that we are seeing on the internet. That’s the reality of Africa. The reality of Africa is if a house has a computer, what an achievement in the house. The whole thing last year, my whole mission was to get parents to buy one computer for the home. Just encouraging them, please just buy one computer because there’s a difference between working on this and working on a computer. And I think that’s one of the things I really need us to hone on when you open discussion because I see her story is very long. So I’m skipping some of the things and I’ll go to what we are doing at Girl Hype. We are not just challenging these norms and societal challenges that women are facing. We’re really bridging the digital divide and we elevating women to come into the tech space and making sure we support them as they grow along. So we have a project in Kamuloi. Kamuloi in Limpopo, when we entered the space, we implemented a coding class in a school. This is 2023. In 2023, South Africa is one of the elite countries that I know of. But in 2023, a school had an internet port going straight to the school principal’s office and he was the one with internet access. And then there was another port going straight to the computer lab, which was giving 30 students access to your computer lab. Now, those students could only access the internet for one hour. And when you upload a PDF, it doesn’t upload because the data was running at 2.7 megabytes per. It was just horrible because I’m not used to that. So I walked in and I said, I can’t work like this. So I went to the sponsors and I said, we need to change this. And thanks to the company that was sponsoring us, they came, we had to rebuild a new computer lab. We had to call the internet service provider, leave what the government had put there because it doesn’t work. Build a new computer lab in the school, get the new internet service provider to come. Fortunately, they agreed to sponsor us for three years, put in the line. When they came, they discovered the whole community has no access to proper internet. In fact, they have access to something. It’s not internet. So they can’t put what is needed to put the broadband. So they had to put new layering. It was such a, like it took us six months to implement a program of two weeks, just building the infrastructure. And that for me was an eye opener to say, we also underestimate how dispersed rural areas and urban areas are because we work in Cape Town. And it’s one of the, all schools have proper internet. All teachers have access to everything. And we couldn’t implement a two week program. It took us six months to lay the proper infrastructure. Those are the realities. We work with Zatna and thanks to them, they’ve really built on cyber security skills and they’re helping us to make sure that girls understand the cyber security online and they understand what are the challenges and how to prepare themselves for future. They were to apply for jobs. What does it mean to post today? Girl High participate on UNIGF WSIS. We advocate for gender responsive policies and making sure that we create mentorship as we enter spaces. And she’s got a call to action to say, ladies and gentlemen, as we deliberate today, let us remember that addressing these challenges requires collective action. It demands that we work together across sectors, borders and disciplines to dismantle the barriers that holds women. Back, I invite you to join hands with organizations like Girl Help to create a future with no women left, no women is left behind in a digital transformation. Together we can build a world where women’s potential is fully realized and their contribution drive innovation, inclusion, and progress for all. Thank you and I look forward to engaging in this inspiring summit ahead. On behalf of TOKO, thank you. We have three minutes for comments. Anyone with a burning comment towards the speakers or questions? The floor is open. Any comments from online? I know you guys can’t hear. I’ll close the session and say thank you very much, Magda. I think at this point you’ve passed the phase of being the secretariat of the Internet Governance Forum to being the champion of the Women in IGF Summit. I really appreciate that. You accepted this program wholeheartedly. And I think it’s beyond what IGF and the secretariat is saying. It’s from you as a person in believing that this platform will change for women participation. And you can see with your commitment and making sure that funding and the speaking and everything. Even you sitting here, I know you have other sessions to be at. You were supposed to be here for 15 minutes. minutes, and you made sure that this session is successful, that doesn’t go noticed. And I’m even getting emotional. Thank you.

Anja Gengo: Can I also thank you, Baratang, sincerely? I think this whole work started really because of you championing women and girls, raising a wonderful girl, if I may also add. You know, yes, I am supposed to go to another session, and it’s very challenging for the Secretariat to be in any of the sessions because of the logistics. But as I said, these sessions are very important to us. They’re close to our heart, and we believe that if we have these types of dialogues, which always give birth to good partnerships and cooperation, then we can make a change. It’s really coincidental that I’m going, and I want to invite you to that session after this one, to a session which will be focused on women and girls that don’t have basic human rights to go to school. There is a session at Workshop Room 4, starting just now, where we will be hearing from colleagues speaking about the situation in Afghanistan, closing of the schools where digital is the only window to those girls and women to continue with their education and with, to an extent, I wouldn’t even call it a normal life according to our standards, but at least a way to communicate with others and to continue learning. And perhaps we will not close this session. We can maybe move to Workshop Room 4 and continue discussing, I think, our global voices really needed for women and girls in that country. I had a great pleasure to work with them a couple of years back. It’s been really a wonderful experience that will always stay with me. And I think now is the time that we respond to them with what we can do within our capacity, the way they were responding to us within their capacity, building, helping us to build this really strong… ecosystem. So thank you so much once again. Thank you very much Baratang. I know it’s been challenging always to be first, but I think you broke the ice and it’s been a wonderful dialogue. Thank you. you … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … …

Agreement Points

Gender digital divide in Africa

speakers

Mactar Seck

Sarah Armstrong

Baratang Miya

arguments

Limited internet access for women, especially in rural areas

Lack of digital skills and literacy among women

Need for improved digital infrastructure and affordability

summary

All speakers agreed that there is a significant gender digital divide in Africa, characterized by limited internet access, lack of digital skills, and inadequate infrastructure, particularly affecting women in rural areas.

Economic impact of women’s digital inclusion

speakers

Mactar Seck

Sarah Armstrong

Baratang Miya

arguments

Excluding women from digital access results in GDP losses

Women’s digital participation can boost economies and innovation

Need to empower women entrepreneurs in digital markets

summary

The speakers concurred that including women in the digital economy would lead to significant economic benefits, including increased GDP, innovation, and entrepreneurship.

Initiatives to promote women’s digital inclusion

speakers

Mactar Seck

Sarah Armstrong

Baratang Miya

arguments

UN ECA programs like Africa Girl Recording Camp

Internet Society and Foundation grants and training programs

GirlHype’s work on digital literacy and infrastructure in schools

summary

All speakers highlighted various initiatives and programs aimed at promoting women’s digital inclusion through training, grants, and infrastructure development.

Policy and representation in internet governance

speakers

Sarah Armstrong

Baratang Miya

Anja Gengo

arguments

Importance of women’s perspectives in internet governance

Need for gender-responsive policies in digital transformation

Women underrepresented in internet governance and policymaking

summary

The speakers agreed on the importance of including women’s perspectives in internet governance and policymaking, emphasizing the need for gender-responsive policies.

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers emphasized the significant economic benefits of including women in the digital economy, highlighting the potential for increased GDP and innovation.

speakers

Mactar Seck

Sarah Armstrong

arguments

Excluding women from digital access results in GDP losses

Women’s digital participation can boost economies and innovation

Both speakers highlighted the interconnected issues of digital skills gaps and infrastructure challenges as key barriers to women’s digital inclusion.

speakers

Sarah Armstrong

Baratang Miya

arguments

Lack of digital skills and literacy among women

Need for improved digital infrastructure and affordability

Unexpected Consensus

Social enterprises as an opportunity for women’s economic participation

speakers

Sarah Armstrong

arguments

Social enterprises as an opportunity for women’s economic participation

explanation

While other speakers focused on broader economic impacts, Armstrong uniquely highlighted social enterprises as a specific opportunity for women’s economic participation in the digital space. This perspective was unexpected but aligns with the overall theme of economic empowerment.

Overall Assessment

Summary

The speakers demonstrated strong agreement on the existence of a gender digital divide, the economic benefits of women’s digital inclusion, the need for initiatives to promote women’s participation, and the importance of women’s representation in internet governance.

Consensus level

High level of consensus among speakers, with shared perspectives on key issues. This strong agreement implies a clear recognition of the challenges and potential solutions for promoting women’s digital inclusion, which could facilitate coordinated efforts and policy development in this area.

Different Viewpoints

Unexpected Differences

Overall Assessment

summary

There were no significant disagreements among the speakers

difference_level

Low level of disagreement. The speakers generally agreed on the main issues and approaches to addressing the gender digital divide. This consensus suggests a unified understanding of the challenges and potential solutions, which could facilitate more effective action in promoting women’s digital inclusion.

Partial Agreements

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers emphasized the significant economic benefits of including women in the digital economy, highlighting the potential for increased GDP and innovation.

speakers

Mactar Seck

Sarah Armstrong

arguments

Excluding women from digital access results in GDP losses

Women’s digital participation can boost economies and innovation

Both speakers highlighted the interconnected issues of digital skills gaps and infrastructure challenges as key barriers to women’s digital inclusion.

speakers

Sarah Armstrong

Baratang Miya

arguments

Lack of digital skills and literacy among women

Need for improved digital infrastructure and affordability

Key Takeaways

There is a significant gender digital divide in Africa, with women having limited access to internet and digital technologies, especially in rural areas

Closing the gender digital divide has major economic benefits, including boosting GDP and innovation

Women are underrepresented in internet governance and policymaking roles related to digital transformation

Initiatives focused on digital skills training, infrastructure improvement, and policy changes are needed to increase women’s digital inclusion

Organizations like UN ECA, Internet Society, and GirlHype are implementing programs to promote women’s digital participation

Resolutions and Action Items

Continue and expand programs providing digital skills training to women and girls

Work to improve digital infrastructure and internet access in rural areas

Increase representation of women in internet governance forums and policymaking

Implement the objectives of the Global Digital Compact related to inclusion and closing the digital divide

Support social enterprises as a way to increase women’s economic participation in the digital economy

Unresolved Issues

How to effectively address cultural barriers limiting women’s digital participation in some regions

Specific strategies to make digital devices and internet access more affordable for women

Ways to increase funding and support for women entrepreneurs in digital markets

How to improve online safety and reduce cyberbullying/harassment of women

Suggested Compromises

None identified

In Africa we have 50.5% of the population are women, and when you look at this access to Internet, we have 30% of women connected to Internet, 31% connected compared to 44% men. The gap is high.

speaker

Mactar Seck

reason

This comment provides concrete statistics highlighting the significant gender gap in internet access in Africa, setting the stage for discussing the challenges and importance of addressing this disparity.

impact

It framed the discussion around the urgency of addressing the gender digital divide and led to further exploration of the reasons behind this gap and potential solutions.

In Africa, we have almost 400 million, more than 400 million without any legal form of identity. And among the 400 million, 60% are women. And this 60% doesn’t have any access to any service.

speaker

Mactar Seck

reason

This insight connects the lack of digital access to broader issues of legal identity and access to services, highlighting the compounded challenges faced by women.

impact

It broadened the conversation beyond just internet access to encompass wider societal and structural issues affecting women’s participation in the digital economy.

We have several programs. We have one program called Africa Girl Recording Camp. What is this program? This program targets women and girls aged from 12 to 25 years to give them digital skills on the robotic, on AI, on what call it on 3D printing, on coding.

speaker

Mactar Seck

reason

This comment introduces a concrete initiative aimed at addressing the skills gap for young women and girls in technology fields.

impact

It shifted the discussion from identifying problems to exploring solutions, providing a tangible example of efforts to empower women in the digital space.

According to the 2024 Global Social Enterprises Report, social enterprises created in 2024 200 million jobs. So this is important. It’s a good, important place for us to focus.

speaker

Sarah Armstrong

reason

This insight introduces the potential of social enterprises as a significant area for job creation and economic empowerment for women.

impact

It added a new dimension to the discussion by highlighting a specific sector (social enterprises) as a potential focus area for addressing gender disparities in the digital economy.

We work with boys and girls. If you put a laptop in front of a boy, there’s nothing wrong with that. 90% of the boys, if it breaks, they call other boys and say, it broke down. We put it in front of girls. If it breaks, they are afraid of coming to me and say, I broke the laptop.

speaker

Baratang Miya

reason

This anecdote provides a vivid illustration of how societal norms and expectations can impact girls’ confidence and approach to technology from an early age.

impact

It brought attention to the subtle psychological barriers that can affect women’s participation in technology, beyond just issues of access and skills.

Overall Assessment

These key comments shaped the discussion by providing a comprehensive view of the challenges facing women in the digital space, from basic access and identity issues to skills development and psychological barriers. They moved the conversation from identifying problems to exploring solutions, highlighting both large-scale initiatives and subtle societal factors that need to be addressed. The discussion evolved from statistical analysis to concrete programs and personal anecdotes, providing a multi-faceted understanding of the issue and potential paths forward.

How can we address the affordability issue for women in Africa to own mobile phones?

speaker

Mactar Seck

explanation

Affordability was identified as a key barrier to women’s access to digital technology in Africa.

What strategies can be implemented to overcome digital skills and language barriers for women in Africa?

speaker

Mactar Seck

explanation

These were highlighted as significant obstacles to women’s participation in the digital economy.

How can we address the issue of digital identity for women in Africa, given that 60% of those without legal identity are women?

speaker

Mactar Seck

explanation

Lack of digital identity prevents women from accessing various services and opportunities.

What measures can be taken to protect women from cybercrime and encourage them to report such incidents?

speaker

Mactar Seck

explanation

Cybercrime against women was identified as a significant issue, with many victims reluctant to report due to cultural barriers.

How can we educate women on responsible data sharing on social media platforms?

speaker

Mactar Seck

explanation

This was identified as an important area for education and awareness, given women’s high participation rates on social media.

What strategies can be employed to increase women’s involvement in artificial intelligence governance and job creation?

speaker

Mactar Seck

explanation

This was highlighted as an important area for creating opportunities for women in the evolving digital landscape.

How can we improve access to affordable devices and online experiences for women?

speaker

Sarah Armstrong

explanation

This was identified as one of the key areas to focus on to close the gender digital divide.

What steps can be taken to increase the availability of relevant products and tools for women in the digital space?

speaker

Sarah Armstrong

explanation

This was highlighted as another crucial area for addressing the gender digital divide.

How can we enhance safety and security for women in online spaces?

speaker

Sarah Armstrong

explanation

This was identified as a critical factor in encouraging women’s participation in digital markets and governance.

What strategies can be employed to increase women’s representation in policy-making spaces for digital transformation?

speaker

Baratang Miya (reading Toko’s speech)

explanation

The underrepresentation of women in these spaces was identified as perpetuating structural barriers to women’s digital participation.

Summary

This discussion focused on addressing the digital divide and improving connectivity in unconnected communities worldwide, particularly in rural and disaster-prone areas. Toshikazu Sakano presented data showing that while 68% of the global population uses the internet, 2.6 billion people remain offline, with a significant urban-rural disparity. To tackle this issue, Sakano introduced the concepts of LACS (Locally Accessible Cloud System) and X-FACE (Extensible Frontline Augmented Communication Exchanger), portable systems that provide local social networking services without relying on internet connectivity.

Babatunde Ojetunde elaborated on X-FACE, describing it as an AI-enhanced upgrade of LACS that offers advanced communication and information-sharing capabilities. The system is designed to operate as a comprehensive local cloud computing platform, adaptable to various local needs. Ojetunde highlighted potential applications in e-education, community networking, e-health, and disaster response.

Jeffrey Llanto discussed the implementation of these technologies in the Philippines, focusing on the challenges faced by island communities vulnerable to disasters. He emphasized the importance of building resilient communities through IT-enabled communication, particularly in areas with limited internet access and unreliable electricity. Llanto outlined collaborative efforts with international partners to develop and deploy these technologies in response to natural disasters and to improve connectivity in isolated regions.

The discussion underscored the potential of decentralized, portable cloud systems to bridge the digital divide, enhance disaster preparedness, and provide essential digital services to underserved communities. The speakers emphasized the importance of international collaboration and standardization efforts to scale these solutions globally.

Keypoints

Major discussion points:

– The digital divide and lack of internet access for 2.6 billion people globally, especially in rural areas

– Introduction of LACS (Locally Accessible Cloud System) and X-FACE technologies to provide local internet/cloud services in unconnected areas

– Use cases for LACS/X-FACE in disaster response, education, healthcare, and community networking in rural/remote areas

– Global collaboration efforts to implement and standardize these technologies, especially in developing regions

Overall purpose:

The discussion aimed to present innovative technological solutions to bridge the digital divide and provide internet/cloud services to unconnected communities, particularly in rural areas and during disasters. The speakers shared research, use cases, and plans for global implementation of portable local cloud systems.

Tone:

The tone was primarily informative and optimistic, with speakers enthusiastically presenting their research and technologies as solutions to global connectivity challenges. There was an underlying sense of urgency regarding the need to address the digital divide, balanced with confidence in the potential of the proposed solutions. The tone remained consistent throughout, focused on sharing knowledge and encouraging further collaboration.

Speakers

– Toshikazu Sakano

Role: Session moderator

Expertise: ICT for development, disaster response technologies

– Babatunde Ojetunde

Role: Researcher at ATR Japan

Expertise: X-FACE and LACS technologies

– Jeffery Llanto

Role: Executive Director of Central Visayas Information Sharing Network Foundation (CVISNET)

Expertise: IT-enabled communication, community resilience projects in the Philippines

Additional speakers:

– Unnamed Audience Members

Role: Session attendees asking questions

– Sandra Mahanan (mentioned but did not speak)

Role: Artificial Intelligence Engineer from Unicom Group of Companies, Nigeria

– Chandra Prakash Sharma (mentioned but did not speak)

Role: CEO of Waze Flux from India

– Jimson Olfe (mentioned but did not speak)

Role: Contemporary Consulting from Nigeria

The Digital Divide: Challenges and Innovative Solutions

This discussion focused on addressing the global digital divide and improving connectivity in unconnected communities worldwide, particularly in rural and disaster-prone areas. The session, moderated by Toshikazu Sakano, an expert in ICT for development and disaster response technologies, brought together researchers and practitioners to explore innovative solutions to bridge the connectivity gap.

Digital Divide Overview

Toshikazu Sakano presented key statistics highlighting the extent of the digital divide. He noted that while internet usage has increased globally, significant disparities remain, especially between urban and rural areas. Sakano emphasized that mobile phone ownership varies greatly between high-income and low-income economies, underscoring the challenges in achieving global digital inclusion.

Innovative Technologies: LACS and X-FACE

To address connectivity challenges, Sakano introduced LACS (Locally Accessible Cloud System) and X-FACE (Extensible Frontline Augmented Communication Exchanger). These portable systems provide local social networking services without relying on internet connectivity. Sakano explained, “We pack small server and Wi-Fi access point within a portable case and running it by battery. So this standalone system can deliver in a local area people the social networking services functions.”

Babatunde Ojetunde, a researcher at ATR Japan, elaborated on X-FACE, describing it as an AI-enhanced upgrade of LACS. He detailed its components, including “a portable access point, tablet, terminal and wearable devices.” Ojetunde emphasized X-FACE’s AI-based information processing and edge computing capabilities, as well as its ability to communicate with external systems.

Applications and Use Cases

The speakers highlighted several potential applications for LACS and X-FACE technologies:

1. Disaster Response: Both Sakano and Jeffrey Llanto emphasized the systems’ utility in disaster scenarios, providing crucial communication capabilities when normal infrastructure is disrupted.

2. E-Education: Ojetunde noted the potential for supporting educational initiatives in areas with limited internet access.

3. Community Networking: The systems can facilitate local information sharing and communication within isolated communities.

4. E-Health: Ojetunde suggested applications in healthcare, potentially enabling telemedicine services in remote areas.

5. Building Resilient Communities: Llanto discussed the implementation of these technologies in the Philippines, focusing on the challenges faced by island communities vulnerable to disasters.

CVISNET Foundation and Philippine Context

Jeffrey Llanto, Executive Director of Central Visayas Information Sharing Network Foundation (CVISNET), provided insights into the foundation’s role in implementing connectivity solutions in the Philippines. He highlighted the unique challenges faced by island communities, stating, “Island communities, which the Philippines has around 7,200 islands on our country, it is very vulnerable to disaster, especially typhoons. Island schools have limited or no internet access. The promotion of ecotourism activities and other economic activities in the islands are disrupted.” This context underscored the importance of developing resilient, adaptable solutions for different geographical settings.

Global Collaboration and Future Plans

The speakers emphasized the importance of international collaboration and standardization efforts to scale these solutions globally:

1. Phased Rollout Strategy: Sakano outlined a strategy for gradually expanding coverage areas.

2. Standardization Efforts: Ojetunde mentioned ongoing work with ITU-T to ensure global interoperability of the X-FACE system.

3. International Partnerships: Llanto discussed collaborative efforts with international partners to develop and deploy these technologies in response to natural disasters and to improve connectivity in isolated regions.

4. Ongoing Research: Ojetunde highlighted continuous efforts to integrate emerging technologies into X-FACE and LACS, focusing on enhancing their capabilities and adaptability to various local needs.

Conclusion

The discussion underscored the potential of decentralized, portable cloud systems like LACS and X-FACE to bridge the digital divide, enhance disaster preparedness, and provide essential digital services to underserved communities. The speakers demonstrated a high level of consensus on the existence of a significant global digital divide and the potential of these technologies to address connectivity issues in unconnected areas and during disasters. The emphasis on international collaboration and ongoing research suggests a strong foundation for future development and implementation of these solutions globally, offering hope for more inclusive digital access worldwide.

Toshikazu Sakano : I will ask her to present something. And next one is role of artificial intelligence in bridging digital divide and fostering inclusion of unconnected communities from Ms. Sandra Mahanan, Artificial Intelligence Engineer from Unicom Group of Companies, Nigeria. And I’m not confirming the presence of her in this session right now, but is Sandra-san joining this session? So if I confirm the presence, I will ask her to talk a bit about her thoughts. Next one, we’ll introduce of Extensible Frontline Augmented Communication Exchanger, X-FACE, and Locally Accessible Cloud System, LACS, by Dr. Babatunde, Ojetunde, from ATR Japan. And this is followed by the user case, use cases, and potential practical deployments of CrossFace from Mr. Chandra Prakash Sharma, CEO of Waze Flux from India. And this will, followed by the potential use cases of X-FACE in Philippines and Asia Pacific, will be presented by Mr. Jeffrey Luanto, Executive Director of Central Visayas Information Sharing Network Foundation, CVISNET from Philippines. And next one will be potential use cases of X-FACE in Nigeria and Africa. from Dr. Jimson Olfe, Contemporary Consulting from Nigeria. This is an overview of our agenda of the session. And after that, we will discuss the theme and objective of this, to achieve the objective of this session. And in 90 minutes later, we will close, closing remarks by myself before closing the session. Okay, this is the agenda of this session. Okay, let’s go in. So before go into the presentations by panelists, let me introduce brief background of this session and the image I have for accelerating the penetration of unconnected worldwide. So this one slide shows the individuals using the internet worldwide from ITU. In 2024, fully 5.5 billion people are online. That represents 68% of the world population compared with 65% just one year earlier. But 2.6 billion people, one third of the global population are still offline. This is a big issue from achieving SDGs. And next slide. Okay, this one slide is percentage of individuals using the internet in urban and rural areas in 2024, also from ITU. In checking this slide, Globally, 83% of urban dwellers are using the internet in 2024 compared with less than half of the rural population, 48%. So of the 2.6 billion people not using the internet, 1.8 billion live in rural areas, again 800 million in urban areas. So people in rural areas, most people in rural areas, especially developing countries, are not connected. This is the issue we need to tackle using the state-of-the-art of ICT. This one slide gives us a hint to solve the issue. This slide shows the percentage of individuals owing a mobile phone and using the internet in 2024. Looking at this, globally, four out of five individuals 10 years old or older own a mobile phone. Universal ownership, meaning a penetration rate of over 95%, has been reached in high-income economies. This stands in contrast with low-income economies where only 56% of the population age 10 years and over own a mobile phone. Looking at the graph, 68% worldwide population are connected to the internet, but 80% own the mobile phone. What’s the meaning of this gap? Looking at the, for example, Africa, 38% population is connected to the internet, but 66% of population have mobile phone. So, half of mobile phone are not used to connect to the internet. Maybe they use only for telephone. So, here are the hints to fill the gap between connected and unconnected. This is another view of the worldwide. This slide shows the number of disasters by continent and top 10 countries in 2023. And looking at this, most disasters happen in Asia region and Americas and Africa, Europe. And the countries like India, China, Philippines, Indonesia, these countries suffered a lot of disasters. This is also the big issue worldwide. To tackle these issues, we, I, have proposed new concept called LACS or cross-phase concept. So, LACS stands for locally accessible cloud system. It’s a portable server system which comprises of compact server, access point, Wi-Fi access points, battery, and peripheral devices. LACS delivers local social networking service anytime, anywhere, and in any network environment, even in the devastated disaster disruption. X-FACE, that stands for Extensible Frontline Augmented Communication Exchanger, is an updated version of LACS in which AI functionality is included to support first responders in disasters. So the concept is very simple. We pack small server and Wi-Fi access point within a portable case and running it by battery. So this standalone system can deliver in a local area people the social networking services functions. And users use their smartphones to connect to this small box and use it for sharing the information and chatting and communication. These things the users can do. But area is limited in local. So this is a concept of LACS and X-FACE. And very recently, non-terrestrial networks for securing connectivity is becoming popular. So people call NTN, non-terrestrial networks, maybe Starlink is a kind of them, draws a lot of attention as a solution to deliver the Internet connectivity in the unconnected areas. But LACS, X-FACE concept, is considered as a complementary relationship with NTNs because this NTN network is usefully used for connecting to the Internet, but LACS, X-FACE deliver the service to local people. So from the point of view of… internet traffic, you can offload the internet traffic. For the local people, without the traffic congestion, you can smoothly use broadband environment for the local communication. So that is one thing. So this last slide shows the strategy for quick penetration of connected using the local ICT system, like lugs and cross-phase. In the first phase, in the first step, distribution of cross-phase of lugs in an area. Each cross-phase delivers broadband local internet environment, as you can see in the right-hand figure. In the next step, distributed cross-phases in a connected with narrowband wireless network. Coverage area is extended to area-wide. Local communication with broadband and area-wide communication with narrowband are possible. So areas are extended to the narrowband wireless communications. And the third step, at least one cross-phase is connected to the internet with, for example, satellite internet service. The area is covered by global internet. So these steps can help to accelerate the penetration of the internet environment, especially in the rural areas in developing countries. This is my thinking. And I want to discuss this issue and thinking in this session. OK. So I hope this session becomes fruitful thanks to the inputs from the wonderful panelists of their ideas and thoughts. Okay, this is my presentation and let’s go into the panel session. And if there are any panelists, you have something to say? I have a question here. Okay, okay.

Audience: First question is related to the price of the cross-phase equipment.

Toshikazu Sakano : Price?

Audience: Cost. For the cross-phase equipment. It’s the first question. You are talking about development campuses that have some people unconnected to the internet. So we need to have a view about how much does it cost to have this ex-phase equipment for this development campus. This is the first question. The second question is, what are the keys you consider to detect disaster or not? I see the map of disasters here. For Asia, it is three times the disaster in Africa and maybe one and a half times the disaster in Turkey. What do you mean by disaster? Disasters?

Toshikazu Sakano : Okay, thank you very much for your question. Does it work? So I’m trying to show several slides. Okay, there are two questions. One thing is the cost issue of cross-phase. So actually, cross-phase, beforehand, we developed a LACS, locally accessible cloud system. This is a portable, standalone social networking service. And this small box with software. We are now establishing the supply chain, and the price right now is $8,000 USD per one set. That kind of cost image we have.

Audience: So you will be responsible for the communication with the satellite in order to have internet provided for these areas covered by cross-phase equipment? What I say is, this $8,000 USD for one equipment of cross-phase will cover the cost of interconnection with the satellite?

Toshikazu Sakano : Once we start distributing, the sales quantity will increase, and then the cost will decrease. So we are now in the very first phase. So the cost or price itself is a little bit expensive, but once we start distributing, the cost will dramatically reduce, and that accelerates the distribution. So that is one thing. And the second question was the disaster distribution worldwide.

Audience: What do you mean by disaster?

Toshikazu Sakano : Yes. So maybe 5 to 10 kinds of disasters are included in that counting. So in these disasters, I hope our ICT solution can help. Because in most disaster situations, the Internet cannot be used. This is the thing. Okay, thank you very much. Okay. Can you use the mic?

Audience: Can you hear me?

Toshikazu Sakano : I don’t know if you can hear me. Can you hear me now?

Audience: Okay, so my question is for the box, right? Do you have to use it only when there’s a disaster? Or it can work even without a disaster case for remote areas that need Internet connection?

Toshikazu Sakano : Okay, thank you very much for the question. And in the panelists, after my presentation, we’ll give the answers. So please ask the table after the panelist’s presentation. So some panelists are talking about the use cases other than disaster situations. So please wait for a while. Okay, so let’s go into the session. Excuse me, are you a participant? Okay, so you must be…

Audience: I’m just attending.

Toshikazu Sakano : Huh?

Audience: I’m just attending.

Toshikazu Sakano : Ah, I see. Yeah, yeah. I’m just attending, not punished. Okay, I see. Okay, so… It’s Uduma-san, no? And Ms. Sandra Mahana-san, here in this session. Okay, so let’s go to the next agenda. And next presenter is… Dr. Babatunde Ojetunde from ATL Japan. He will talk about cross-phase in more detail. Okay?

Babatunde Ojetunde: Yeah, thank you. Can you hear me? Thank you, Dr. Sakano. I am Ojiatunde Babatunde from HCL. And today I will be talking about the introduction of X-FACE or COSFIS as we used to call it. So first I will talk about the challenges, brief challenges of digital divide in the world. And then I will talk about the concept or the system that we have introduced to address these challenges and show some of the potential use cases in terms of just overview. Then I will go into our collaboration efforts worldwide. So as introduced by Dr. Sakandu, nearly one third of the global population lacks access to basic digital services technology as of 2023. This is often prone to rural area and remote area where there are no internet facilities for people. So there are challenges in terms of educational purposes, healthcare resources through digital means. Also there are limited access to digital services because there is no reliable internet infrastructure in place. So these are the issues that we try to address in our system in HCL. So I will be showing the systems and some of the use cases. So I will go into the details now. Okay, so in 2018, we proposed a locally cloud accessible system, LACS, this system is a decentralized cloud infrastructure that allows people in a local community or local area to be able to communicate with each other. This project was started from MDRVU, then it moved to LACS, and now it’s out on X-FACE, which is an inclusion of artificial intelligence. It’s a portable system that has hardware like a small server, access point, and mobile phone and other devices that can be connected to it. So, we created this first to address disaster issues, but it can also be used for other issues like e-education and so on. So, I’ll move to the next slide. So, what are some of the components of LACS itself? So, LACS is a locally cloud accessible system that provides cloud-like services that is essential for areas that don’t have internet connection. It can serve as a mini cloud hub, it functions as an extendable system without requiring constant internet connectivity. It can also be used to deliver essential cloud services to communities, to local communities through decentralized infrastructure. And as Dr. Sarkarussan shows, you can see the interconnection of different LACS or X-FACE systems. ensure that rural areas can have access to digital systems in a looker way. So this is the prototype of LAT. As you can see, we have a server, a Wi-Fi access point, a battery, a network hub, and it has a case that you can use to put your mobile phone tablet, and also it has this case that is very portable. You can easily move it around. So this is the prototype of a LAT system that we first created to address this issue. Next, I will talk about Extensive Frontline Augmented Communication Exchanger, CROSSFIX or X-FACE. This is an upgrade of LAT to address further issues. We introduced this to be able to include artificial intelligence, which can help in the processing of data faster, and it can allow people to operate it hands-free without having to type. So the AI can accept your speech and transcribe it into text for you, or it can also analyze digital images and so on. So what is X-FACE? X-FACE is an upgrade of LAT that has advanced functions, including artificial intelligence, which enhances communication and information sharing. It operates like a comprehensive local cloud computing platform, and this system is adaptable to meet various local needs and contexts effectively. So this is an image of X-FACE. As you can see, in this picture, there is a cross face with solar panel, so it doesn’t only use a small battery, now we have upgraded it to a solar panel and it can run for more time. So what are the cross face architecture and key features? Cross face consists of a portable access point, tablet, terminal and wearable devices can be used together as we can see at this site, we have tablet, smartphone and other wearable device, this can be used with X-FACE and it also has an AI based information processing and edge computing platform which we built into the cross face core and it can also communicate with other external system like you can use standards to connect to this, so these are the features and the architecture of cross face. So now here is the big image of cross face, as you can see we have a solar panel and the cross face core and everything is packed into the cross face core consists of devices that are packed into this box so that we can move it around easily, so it functions like a local server that acts as a mini cloud hub for data processing and also it has an extended area with communication devices up to one kilometer or more. more if we apply LVWE such as motor, Wi-Fi, AMO and so on, so we can extend the communication to one kilometer or more. Also, there is a local speech recognition technology. What this means is that we don’t have to connect to the internet to be able to use the speech recognition. We have already built it into the box so that it can process your speech locally. And again, there is an edge computing capability that enables time processing data without depending on an external system and this can allow it to function efficiently and manage the data locally efficiently. So what are the other features? It can also support seamless integration with other existing local infrastructure. It can encourage local storage for critical information sharing. It has AI-driven features for optimizing resources and it uses the user-friendly interface that allows people to be able to use the software that is processing the information easily. And also, we look at integrating learning management into it so that it can facilitate e-education. So what are the AI-driven features that we have? There is a natural language processing that supports multilingual communication and also it has advanced image analysis capabilities for communities where that kind of service is needed. It also uses a geographical information system to show where people are in real time and also computer vision automation to assess damaged areas during disaster and it can predict this. and so on. So how can we use cross links for labs to build a bridge-digital divide? One way is to use it for e-education. For example, in the rural area where there’s no internet connection, we can implement labs and use it so that students can have access to educational resources and they can participate in remote learning through the Looker Cloud. The learning management system can enable continuous learning in remote areas and can ensure that digital literacy programs can help our communities where these kinds of skills are needed. So this is an image of the architecture of the labs configuration that we have done in the past using a learning management system that allows students to be able to learn remotely. This will be expanded when we talk about the use cases in the Philippines and other areas. Also, we can use it to build a bridge-digital divide by providing a community network. So in rural areas where there are no internet and network facilities, if we interconnect multiple labs, we can use this to create a community network as Dr. Sakano showed in his picture the other time. So by connecting one lab to another and to another, then we can create a local community where people can communicate with each other using this kind of system. And this configuration can use a mesh network prototype to achieve this. So communities can gain access to digital skills, training, employment, opportunities through the platform. And it can also be used for e-health, so where you can get do telemedicine services. Doctors can connect to the labs in remote areas and can talk to people about their health conditions and so on. So local content creation and sharing can foster cultural preservation in this community. So labs can also be used for other digital services like email, web and e-government functionalities where the local government can post some information to the rural people on an electronic board and they can read it and this can be transcribed into local languages so that they can understand. So how can we use this for bridging digital divides in terms of enhancing community resilience? So for this, as we have heard from Dr. Sakamono, disasters have come to various areas in the world. So labs can be used to provide some services so that people can have access to essential information during this period. So essential communication can remain in this area that is affected by a disaster using X_FACE and labs together so people can still communicate when disasters occur. The system also provides an automated emergency alert system within X-FACE and it can allow first responders to coordinate their activities during crisis situations. Also local data storage ensures that critical information remains during emergencies. Community resilience is another one and also telemedicine services can be provided, healthcare information. It can also be used in agricultural systems also. So the last slide is… So this is one of the tests we have done using it for disaster, for example, when we use X-CrossFace in disaster, we have 3D image that is mapped into X-CrossFace, and when the area is destroyed, we can project back the original image of the area and first responders can use information from the AI to identify if there is a building in the location, how many people are living in that location originally, and how many people have been reported missing or found in that kind of situation. So now I will talk about our global impact effort. Through 2018 to 2021, we have standardized LACS, and currently we are standardizing with ITU-T the X-CrossFace system so that it can have interoperability worldwide and it can be used globally. Other global impacts is our use case in the Philippines. This will be talked more when we are talking about the use case in the Philippines. Recently, we are expanding the LACS and X-CrossFace into other parts of the world, especially Africa, so we had a workshop with people from Nigeria talking about how we can use LACS to bridge digital divide and connect people in Nigeria and other parts of Africa. For future roadmap and collaboration, we are continuing to carry out research to integrate emerging technologies into the X-CrossFace and LACS, and also international partnership being formed to scale the solution globally. So partnership opportunity with NGOs, government agencies, and private sectors are encouraged. These are collaborating partners as of now, so we are open to… in collaboration with other partners from around the world. So thank you, in summary, that’s my presentation. Thank you.

Toshikazu Sakano : Okay, thank you very much, Dr. Babatunde. Okay, so a similar presentation about more realistic use cases will be followed. So I will go into the next panelist and the panelist’s presentation after that, Q&A and discussion session, okay? So we’ll go into the next panelist. So next panelist is, okay, next presentation is from use cases and potential practical deployments of CrossFace. He is CEO of Wizflux Company in India. CP, could you start the presentation by sharing the slide by yourself, okay? He wants to present a presentation. Can you speak now? Okay, so what about sharing the slide? CP, do you share the slides by yourself? Okay, CP can you hear me? So, the system is a bit troubled, so we will go into the next presentation by Jeffrey Rilanto. And during his presentation, the problem will be fixed. So CP, please do your presentation after Jeffrey. Is it okay? Okay. Okay, thank you very much. And Jeffrey, so we will show your presentation slide. So then, please start your presentation. So I believe Jeffrey’s presentation is shared. Slide is changed by the venue, so Jeffrey-san, in your presentation, please say next slide, please, then Tsun-san operate it. Is it okay? Can you hear me, Jeffrey-san? Yes, I can hear you. Okay, so please start your presentation.

Jeffery Llanto: Okay, so from the Philippines, I would like to greet everybody a good afternoon, and I hope everything is doing well there in IGF 2024 in Saudi Arabia. My presentation today is Building Resilient Communities through IT-Enabled Communication with Use Cases of X-Based Projects in the Philippines. I’m Jeffrey Llanto of CVISNET Foundation based here in Cebu, the Philippines. Next slide, please. So just to give a short note, CVISNET Foundation is an organization that started as a project of the government way back in 1990s to provide immediate Internet connection to the entire country. I was working with the government before with the Department of Science and Technology, and we provided the first Internet connection to the government, academe, the private sector, and eventually it evolved into a foundation that becomes an Internet service provider. So CVISNET is empowering communities. We have proven expertise with 25 years experience in partnership with the government and international organizations such as the Advanced Telecommunication Research of Japan under Dr. Toshikazu Sakano, and also our partners from India with CB Sharma. Next slide, please. So we, as mentioned, we have local international partners. These are just what we are working together with. We have here ATR and the other partners that we have around the world. Can we move to the next slide? Next slide, please. Can we move to the next slide, please? I think it’s not moving. Okay. I am sharing my slide right now, so let me please continue. Again, going back to the CPSF Foundation, it’s a project in the government in the Philippines that evolved into a foundation. It’s a self-sustaining foundation that works closely with international organizations like APR and other organizations. Next is the challenges that we experience here in the Philippines, especially during disaster time. What we have is that island communities, which the Philippines has around 7,200 islands on our country, it is very vulnerable to disaster, especially typhoons. Island schools have limited or no internet access. The promotion of ecotourism activities and other economic activities in the islands are disrupted. We have unstable and expensive internet connection and unreliable and limited electricity on these isolated islands. Let me share to you some of the activities that we have been working with different organizations like NTT and ATR Newsflux. So during the time frame of 2011 to our present year right now, we have been working with Japan on research and development effort. Sad to note that everything started with disaster, but we are learning several things of research and development. So everything started during the 2011, the Great Japan Earthquake and also with the 2013 the Typhoon Haiyan or called Yolanda in the Philippines. We conducted several research and development activities with Japan, which is the movable and deployable resource unit in 2014 to 2017. Then the locally accessible cloud system, 2019 to 2023 and right now the extended project back space, but before it’s called the front line.

Agreement Points

Significant global digital divide

Toshikazu Sakano

Babatunde Ojetunde

2.6 billion people worldwide still lack internet access

Nearly one-third of the global population lacks access to basic digital services

Both speakers emphasize the large number of people globally who lack access to internet or digital services, highlighting the persistent digital divide.

LACS/X-Face as solution for areas without connectivity

Toshikazu Sakano

Babatunde Ojetunde

LACS is a portable, standalone system that provides local social networking services

X-Face is an upgraded version of LACS that includes AI functionality

Both speakers present LACS and X-Face as technological solutions to provide internet-like services in areas without connectivity, with X-Face being an enhanced version of LACS.

Usefulness in disaster scenarios

Toshikazu Sakano

Jeffery Llanto

Can be used for disaster response and communication

Used for building resilient communities in disaster-prone areas like the Philippines

Both speakers highlight the potential of LACS/X-Face systems in disaster scenarios, particularly in providing communication capabilities when normal infrastructure is disrupted.

Similar Viewpoints

All three speakers emphasize the importance of global collaboration and standardization efforts to implement and expand the use of LACS/X-Face technologies worldwide.

Toshikazu Sakano

Babatunde Ojetunde

Jeffery Llanto

Strategy for phased rollout to expand coverage areas

Standardization efforts with ITU-T for global interoperability

Partnerships with organizations in various countries, including the Philippines

Unexpected Consensus

Versatility of LACS/X-Face beyond disaster response

Babatunde Ojetunde

Jeffery Llanto

Potential applications in e-education, community networks, and e-health

Can address challenges of island communities with limited internet and electricity

While the initial focus was on disaster response, both speakers highlight the broader applications of the technology in addressing various aspects of the digital divide, including education and healthcare.

Overall Assessment

Summary

The speakers show strong agreement on the existence of a significant global digital divide, the potential of LACS/X-Face technologies to address this issue, and the importance of global collaboration in implementing these solutions.

Consensus level

High level of consensus among the speakers, suggesting a unified approach to addressing the digital divide through innovative technologies like LACS and X-Face. This consensus implies a strong foundation for future development and implementation of these technologies globally.

Different Viewpoints

Unexpected Differences

Overall Assessment

summary

The speakers generally agreed on the challenges of the digital divide and the potential of LACS and X-Face technologies to address these issues.

difference_level

Low level of disagreement. The speakers presented complementary information and perspectives, focusing on different aspects of the same overall goal of bridging the digital divide.

Partial Agreements

Similar Viewpoints

All three speakers emphasize the importance of global collaboration and standardization efforts to implement and expand the use of LACS/X-Face technologies worldwide.

Toshikazu Sakano

Babatunde Ojetunde

Jeffery Llanto

Strategy for phased rollout to expand coverage areas

Standardization efforts with ITU-T for global interoperability

Partnerships with organizations in various countries, including the Philippines

Key Takeaways

A significant digital divide exists globally, with 2.6 billion people still lacking internet access, particularly in rural areas

LACS and X-Face technologies offer portable, standalone systems to provide local cloud-like services and communication in areas without reliable internet

These technologies have potential applications in disaster response, e-education, community networks, and e-health

Global collaboration and standardization efforts are underway to implement these solutions in various countries

Resolutions and Action Items

Ongoing standardization of X-Face system with ITU-T for global interoperability

Expansion of LACS and X-Face implementations into Africa, particularly Nigeria

Continued research to integrate emerging technologies into X-Face and LACS

Unresolved Issues

Specific strategies for reducing the cost of X-Face equipment as production scales up

Detailed plans for integrating X-Face with existing infrastructure in different countries

Methods for ensuring long-term sustainability of X-Face implementations in rural areas

Suggested Compromises

Using X-Face as a complementary solution alongside non-terrestrial networks (NTNs) to balance local and global connectivity needs

Globally, four out of five individuals 10 years old or older own a mobile phone. Universal ownership, meaning a penetration rate of over 95%, has been reached in high-income economies. This stands in contrast with low-income economies where only 56% of the population age 10 years and over own a mobile phone.

speaker

Toshikazu Sakano

reason

This comment provides crucial data on mobile phone ownership, highlighting the disparity between high-income and low-income economies. It’s insightful because it sets the stage for discussing potential solutions to bridge the digital divide.

impact

This observation led to a deeper discussion about leveraging existing mobile phone infrastructure to increase internet connectivity in underserved areas.

We pack small server and Wi-Fi access point within a portable case and running it by battery. So this standalone system can deliver in a local area people the social networking services functions. And users use their smartphones to connect to this small box and use it for sharing the information and chatting and communication.

speaker

Toshikazu Sakano

reason

This comment introduces the innovative concept of LACS and X-FACE, presenting a practical solution to provide local internet services in areas with limited connectivity.

impact

It shifted the conversation from identifying problems to discussing concrete solutions, sparking interest in the technical details and potential applications of this technology.

X-face consists of a portable access point, tablet, terminal and wearable devices can be used together as we can see at this site, we have tablet, smartphone and other wearable device, this can be used with X-Face and it also has an AI based information processing and edge computing platform which we built into the cross face core and it can also communicate with other external system like you can use standards to connect to this

speaker

Babatunde Ojetunde

reason

This comment provides a detailed explanation of the X-FACE system, highlighting its versatility and advanced features like AI-based processing and edge computing.

impact

It deepened the technical discussion and opened up conversations about various potential applications of the technology in different scenarios.

Island communities, which the Philippines has around 7,200 islands on our country, it is very vulnerable to disaster, especially typhoons. Island schools have limited or no internet access. The promotion of ecotourism activities and other economic activities in the islands are disrupted.

speaker

Jeffery Llanto

reason

This comment provides a real-world context for the challenges faced in implementing internet connectivity, particularly in a geographically diverse country prone to natural disasters.

impact

It grounded the discussion in practical realities and highlighted the importance of developing resilient, adaptable solutions for different geographical contexts.

Overall Assessment

These key comments shaped the discussion by progressively moving from identifying global connectivity challenges to proposing and explaining innovative technological solutions. The conversation evolved from statistical analysis of the digital divide to detailed explanations of new technologies like LACS and X-FACE, and finally to real-world applications and challenges in specific contexts like the Philippines. This progression allowed for a comprehensive exploration of both the problem and potential solutions, while also highlighting the complexity of implementing these solutions in diverse geographical and economic settings.

What is the cost of the X-Face equipment?

speaker

Audience member

explanation

Understanding the cost is important for assessing the feasibility of deploying X-Face in developing areas with limited resources.

What criteria are used to define and classify disasters in the global disaster map?

speaker

Audience member

explanation

Clarifying the definition of disasters is crucial for accurately assessing the need for and potential impact of X-Face in different regions.

Can X-Face be used in non-disaster situations for providing internet connectivity in remote areas?

speaker

Audience member

explanation

Understanding the full range of applications for X-Face is important for maximizing its potential impact on bridging the digital divide.

How can X-Face be integrated with existing local infrastructure?

speaker

Babatunde Ojetunde

explanation

Exploring integration possibilities is crucial for ensuring X-Face can be effectively deployed in various contexts.

What are the potential applications of X-Face for e-education, e-health, and e-government services?

speaker

Babatunde Ojetunde

explanation

Investigating these applications is important for understanding how X-Face can address various aspects of the digital divide.

How can partnerships with NGOs, government agencies, and private sectors be formed to scale X-Face globally?

speaker

Babatunde Ojetunde

explanation

Exploring partnership opportunities is crucial for the widespread adoption and impact of X-Face.