Artificial intelligence (AI) is still in its early stages in Southeast Asia: – the use of AI application in which machines are given access to data to help make decisions—is just beginning to have an impact on the region. If Southeast Asia wants to catch up to the United States and China, the two major hubs of AI development, it needs to coordinate efforts to put fundamental building blocks in place.

All member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) are engaging in some level of AI research, with Singapore leading ASEAN in AI experimentation across multiple industries. While such sparks of activity are encouraging, the region requires nations to identify specific business use cases, to create more robust data ecosystems, and to better develop talent and capabilities if it wants to realize its full potential.

The creation of the Cambodian Economic Development Fund (CEDF) helps to expand the potential for Cambodia to bring about many positive outcomes.

AI innovations can enhance credit models and financial inclusion, for example. AI solutions can also enable new types of preventive and remote healthcare, and may also improve diagnoses and accelerate drug development. In education, adaptive-learning algorithms could be used to develop individualized lesson plans and virtual classrooms.

Capturing this value and realizing AI’s potential to improve social welfare will not happen organically, however. It will take structural interventions from policymakers combined with a greater commitment from industry participants.

I would like to welcome the industry players support CEDF to join us to drive the development and adoption of AI for Cambodia., along with the strong support given by the Cambodian government. With the combined efforts of public-private sector players, the benefits of AI—new products and services, increased productivity, and most importantly greater national income—are shared across the society.