The need to develop Artificial Intelligence (AI) as an ethical solution has been highlighted by the Chief Executive Officer of Digital Realty, Nigeria, Engr Ikechukwu Nnamani.
Nnamani stated this during a courtesy visit by the Executive Committee of the Nigeria Information Technology Reporters’ Association (NITRA) following the association’s ICT Growth Conference with the theme, ‘Impact of AI on National Development: Prospects, Policies and Challenges in Nigeria.’
He noted that the people developing ethical solutions for AI are few compared to people producing non-ethical solutions, but have come to take advantage and make money.
Nnamani explained that this trend is not peculiar to Nigeria, but also the reason most developed countries are seeking ways to regulate AI as soon as possible.
He said: “Even the U.S. has a major effort, both in their congress as well as the executive, to ensure there is work being done on AI safety and best practices, reason being that some companies or individuals are only looking at AI from the value it adds to them, without thinking of what the consequences for any value are. One starts looking at it from an ethical standpoint
“In the U.S. and every other country, their governments are actively involved in creating the right policy, to be sure that it is not abused. But more importantly, to be sure they are able to answer it well.”
While applauding the regulators, Nnamani said on the side of regulation in Nigeria, it is a work in progress.
“I don’t even see it as a problem or challenge because to the best of my knowledge, AI has not gone too far in its adoption in Nigeria. That means our government across all areas need to look back and ask, is there any potential harm from this service or technology? How do we mitigate it? What do we do to stop that harm? And these are things they are doing now by asking people to check things just to be sure that whatever applications you are running, you are running it ethically,” he said.
Nnamani, however, allayed fears of unnecessary joblessness, noting that the advent of AI will further drive up-skilling of Nigerians. “Some have said AI will take jobs away. So, should we stop? Truth is that it is not AI taking anybody’s job away; it is just a case of people needing to be re-trained and find out how to use AI for better efficiency and cost-effectiveness.”
Also speaking on the state of Data Centres in Nigeria, Nnamani noted that although Nigeria has increased the number of Data Centres operational in the country in the past few years, it is not yet enough to take care of its bourgeoning data and digital economy.
“Some report that was published some years back indicated that Nigeria, as at now, should have at least 600 megawatts of IT load, giving the size of our economy, population, GDP and what it should be if we are a truly digital economy.
“Today we have about 30 megawatts. So, you can see the percentage of what we have compared to what we need to have. That is even in terms of the size of IT load which is a matrix we use.
“In terms of quantity, for instance, if you go to a city like Toronto, last time I checked, there were over 30 Data Centers in that city. The reality is that we have not started; we are not even anywhere close to starting if we really understand what needs to be done to have a truly digital economy,” he added.
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