Decisions made by artificial intelligence (AI) systems have direct and growing influence on our societies, their organization and the environment. Therefore, AI should be considered to be a policy component geared towards economic, social and environmental progress. Today, a number of risks have been identified, including the rapidly growing digital divide and excessive concentration of the AI market. To curb them, it is important to ensure equal access to AI so that everyone across the globe – including large companies and start-ups, researchers and students – can benefit from it and develop new ideas to realize its full potential while helping to identify its limits. 

Ahead of the AI Action Summit, work needs to be done to build a common and open infrastructure to implement this vision in concrete terms at all points in the AI value chain, from access to data and computing capacity to the development of low-energy models adapted to specific needs.

A fully inclusive approach should be used, involving as many AI ecosystem stakeholders as possible from all backgrounds. Civil society – including researchers, experts, and NGOs specialized in IT – will be closely involved in the entire process from now until the Summit. Moreover, this work will be conducted in direct cooperation with AI actors who seek to develop similar and/or complementary initiatives, including within the United Nations.   

The building of this open infrastructure will be based on the following objectives:

  • Promoting the accessibility of AI systems;
  • Encouraging the development of more cost-effective models to serve the common interest;
  • Fostering access to structured datasets that respect individual freedoms to drive tangible AI breakthroughs in the areas of health and the environment;
  • Developing a greater distribution of access to computing power;
  • Training future talents at global level;
  • Increasing resources for auditing and evaluating models;

This initiative would be based on a multi-stakeholder governance and could have its own investment capacity.

Updated : 2 October 2024