Jumping 19 places from last year, India has ranked 32nd among 181 nations in the AI Readiness Index 2022. According to a statement on the government’s AI portal, INDIAai, experts have said that the world is beginning to see the impact of India’s National AI Strategy, published in 2018. The quality of India’s IT talent pool is a contributing factor.
The report stated that the country has developed several initiatives aimed at embedding AI use throughout all levels of government and society, as well as ensuring that technological developments reinforce India’s place in the international realm.
For example, its draft National Data Governance Framework aims to transform and modernise the government’s data collection and management processes and systems. The government also recently announced that it would train three million government officials in AI and other emerging technologies. Other initiatives include India’s Semiconductor Mission, which seeks ‘to drive the long-term strategies for developing sustainable semiconductors and display ecosystem.’
The report said that investment in research and development and fostering a culture of innovation will likely be important for countries in the South Asian region in the future. Moreover, there is a lack of domestically produced hardware in the region that is vital for developing AI, such as semiconductors and supercomputers. The report also stressed the need for governmental leadership in this area to ensure it can make the most of its rich data.
OpenGov Asia reported earlier that India will Chair the Global Partnership on Artificial Intelligence (GPAI), an international initiative to support the responsible and human-centric development and use of AI. India has said it would work in close cooperation with member states to put in place a framework to fully exploit the power of AI for the good of consumers across the globe and ensure there are adequate guardrails to prevent misuse and user harm.
The AI Readiness Index splits the world into nine regions based on a combination of the UN and the World Bank regional groupings: North America; Latin America & the Caribbean; Western Europe; Eastern Europe; Sub-Saharan Africa; the Middle East & North Africa; South & Central Asia; and the Pacific.
For each region, a regional analysis was included. The analysis is based on a combination of interviews held with regional experts, index scores, and desk research. South and Central Asian insights were provided by INDIAai.
The USA leads the index overall, but Singapore leads in two of three pillars. Both the USA and Singapore are ahead of the other top-scoring countries, with a 5.58-point difference between Singapore and the United Kingdom, which comes in third place.
While Western European countries make up half of the top 20, only the United Kingdom, Finland, France, and the Netherlands are in the top 10. Other top positions are taken by the leading East Asian countries, Singapore, the Republic of Korea, and Japan. Also, according to the report, AI strategy work is dominated by middle-income countries.
The AI market globally was nearly US$ 59.67 billion in 2021 and is projected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 39.4% to reach around US$ 422.37 billion by 2028. With the rapid growth of AI and machine learning (ML), experts predict that most businesses will shift to AI-powered systems, apps, security systems, data analysis, and other applications in the future. AI is expected to add US$ 967 billion to India’s economy by 2035 and US$ 450–500 billion to India’s GDP by 2025, accounting for 10% of the country’s US $5 trillion GDP target.
