The simulation of human intelligence in machines designed to think and act like humans commonly known as Artificial Intelligence (AI) has proven to be the new order of the 21st century.
This new technology abbreviated as AI has been viewed with skepticism considering its negative impact and potential ability to render many jobless despite its immeasurable benefits in promoting the quality of life and human existence.
To remain relevant in an era where technological innovation and advancement grows rapidly, workers and potential employees have been admonished to learn and adopt to the growing trends of Artificial Intelligence.
Speaking at the opening ceremony of the 2024 Ghana Data Science Summit (INDABAXGHANA) at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in Kumasi, cofounder of INDABAXGHANA, Delali Agbenyega underpinned how employees can immunize themselves against joblessness as a result of AI revolution.
“Almost everyone is complaining that AI will soon take their jobs but it is dependent on your type of job. If you learn AI and get to know how to use AI to do your job, you will remain relevant to your employer and you will not loose your job,” he said.
Highlighting on the theme of the conference; “Unleashing the Potential of Al through Grassroots Engagement”, Delali Agbenyega called for a stakeholder collaboration to build capacity and ensure the responsible use of AI.
“Everything in the world now is about AI so the conference is aimed at how we can benefit from this new innovation and build capacity as a country. Other countries like the U.S and others are far advanced when it comes to AI and we can catch up if the Ministry of Education and other sectors of the Ghanaian economy partner with INDABA and Ghana Data Science to see how we are reviewing our syllabus to introduce AI to our students at an early age and to better other sectors of our country,” he stated.
“While we acknowledge the good side of AI, we are also careful about negatives and the training that we are giving is to ensure that AI is unbiased and built responsibly to promote its ethical use,” he said.
Scientific Director of the Responsibly Artificial Intelligence Lab (RAIL) in KNUST, Prof. Jerry John Kponyo underscored the relevance of AI and called on government to expedite action on the AI bill.
“AI is affecting key areas of the economy from agriculture, health to governance and it is anticipated that 97 million new jobs are going to created as a result of AI. So we need to strategically position ourselves as a nation to be able to maximize the benefits. Likely for us, the GIZ and ministry of communication have presented an AI draft and just like other African countries, we need to quickly expedite action to pass this strategy through a lay down implementation plan. The strategy is from 2023 to 2033 and we are already behind time hence we need to act quickly,” he admonished.
The 2024 IndabaXGhana Conference was hosted in partnership with the Responsible Artificial Intelligence Lab (RAIL) and it has for over the past 4 to 5 years, successfully brought together over 1,000 researchers, professionals, faculty and students in Data Scienee and Machine Learning for capacity building, to showcase research and discuss on how emerging technologies can be used for sustainable development in Ghana and beyond.
Issah Zakariah|AkomaFM|Kumasi
