How Can the Indian Economy Get a $957 Billion Boost? AI Is the Answer

All across the globe, countries have been building up Artifical Intelligence capabilities due to the possibility that AI could completely transform the nature of work and create better outcomes for businesses and society.

In the case of India, even though the country has tech-savvy talent, renowned educational institutes, and corporations and entrepreneurs working on AI, key indicators still need development.

An Accenture report estimates that Artificial Intelligence has the potential to add $957 billion, or 15% of current gross value, to India’s economy, by 2035. The report outlines how India can benefit from AI.

According to the report, AI can be used to:-

1) Mobilise intelligent automation, and automate complex physical world tasks.
2) Empower existing workforces and complement their skills and talent.
3) Drive innovation, with AI being used for broad structural economic transformation.

Flipkart, India’s top e-commerce player, is already tapping into AI, using the technology in operations ranging from conversational search, visual similarity, better last-mile delivery, fraud-detection, personalisation to warehousing.

The technology is expected to help Flipkart serve its existing customers better, and attract new ones as well.

The emphasis and importance given to AI is rather one-sided, reports the Financial Express. On the one hand, our technical universities have done nothing to strengthen the AI ecosystem, and on the other hand, AI-based start-ups are witnessing higher-than-average growth in India, since 2011. In fact, India ranked third among G20 nations, measured by the number of AI-startups.

The Accenture report details out ways in which India can cash in on AI, given that the future is here, and it is best to act now.

Here are the steps:

1) Create a national AI plan, a roadmap for the technology, in India’s economic development. In a manner similar to China, which has laid out clear targets for AI development in phases, a national-level AI plan with clear milestones would be a great idea.

2) Strengthen the R&D ecosystem, by collaborating with private and government organisations. For example, the Canadian government is investing C$125 million in a Pan-Canadian Artificial Intelligence strategy. This program will be led by Canadian Institute for Advanced Research (CIFAR).

3) Open up data-access to small enterprises, like the Open Government Data (OGD) platform in India, a single-access-point for the public, to datasets, documents, services, tools and applications.

4) Making people AI-ready, and encouraging companies to undertake training programs for staff. For example, the UK government has pledged 84 million pounds, to train an additional 8,000 computer science teachers at a new national Centre for Computing, and plans to work in conjunction with the government, to provide teaching resources.

You may also like: Bennett University Becomes India’s First Private Institute to Get an A.I Supercomputer!

5) Implement smart regulations, by approaching AI with the twin objective of promoting trust, and preserving maximum flexibility to innovate. In the area of autonomous vehicular insurance, an excellent example of its implementation was the idea of two-way insurance policies suggested by the UK Department for Transport.

These cover motorists whether they are driving or not. If the car is in drivers mode, companies can recover the cost of claims from the party responsible for the crash, which may be the manufacturer.

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