IMF Managing Director urges Ghana to embrace AI for development

The Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Kristalina Georgieva has said it is time for developing countries such as Ghana to take advantage of Artificial Intelligence (AI) for mutual benefit.

She was speaking at an AI summit focused on unraveling AI's challenges and opportunities in developing countries, themed, "AI as a Catalyst to Transform Economies in Sub-Saharan Africa."

The summit featured a panel discussion exploring AI's implications for emerging economies, particularly Ghana's digitalisation and AI readiness, aiming to strategise for positive outcomes amidst the 4th industrial revolution.

Ms Georgieva emphasized the need to harness AI's potential while mitigating inequalities, misinformation, and other negative impacts. 

She highlighted AI's capacity to boost productivity by 3-5% and stressed the importance of preventing its misuse.

“We can see three, four, five percent productivity gained if we go forward with artificial intelligence effectively. We definitely need something that will inject more dynamism in the world economy. Second, we also need to recognise that the skilled impact of artificial intelligence is gigantic. We have to think how we can make the best out of it, prevent artificial intelligence instead of source of good to turn into a source of inequality, misinformation deepfakes, distortion in our lives”, she stated.