How the UN is Using Robots, Artificial Intelligence, and Self-Driving Cars to Make the World Better
By Annie Rosenthal as part of the 2018 +SocialGood series on emerging technologies
2017 was a year of extreme progress on the development and production of robots worldwide. Robots are becoming more accurate, sophisticated, and effective, making them potentially useful in a host of development programs. Innovators are realistically imagining a future where robots and self-driving cars can diagnose diseases, prepare meals, and deliver aid. Similarly, artificial intelligence is being used to support the Global Goals.
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The United Nations is a leader in the field of innovative development. They are pushing the boundaries of what seems possible to support a vision of a world that is happy, healthy, and secure. Read on to learn some of the ways these emerging technologies are being used by the UN to support global development.
Teaching Robots How to Detect Xenophobia Online: UNHCR’s Innovation Service partnered with UN Global Pulse, the UN initiative for big data analytics, to learn more about how data patterns could provide insights into cross-border movements. By using machine-learning to track Twitter word usages, their robots were able to be trained with a human rights-based bias:
“The team ‘taught’ a machine to ‘learn’ how to read, compile, categorise, anonymise, and aggregate different types of Twitter posts, in different languages and across cities and to quantify both xenophobia and integration-friendly comments.”
Learn more about UNHCR’s program here.
UNDP Uses Artificial Intelligence to Track the Global Goals: The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) lay out a plan to end poverty, fight inequality and stop climate change. The achievement of these targets will rely on the ability of nation’s worldwide to gather and track data. UNDP is using artificial intelligence to assist country’s with the evaluation of their national development plans. The implementation of this program has reduced the time it takes to conduct the evaluation — from 3–4 weeks to 3–4 days.
Learn more about UNDP’s program here.
The World Food Programme Experiments with Self-Driving Trucks: The World Food Programme is one of the first responders to areas of war, civil conflict, and natural disasters. For example, in February 2017 alone, WFP brought food assistance to more than 3.5 million people in Syria. However, the envoys delivering food and assistance aid into these conflict settings are often at risk. That is why WFP is exploring how they could use self-driving truck to support the future of humanitarian aid.
Learn more about WFP’s program here.
Other ways the United Nations is leading the way:
- Teaching an AI About Empathy — and Learning About Ourselve
- Unlocking Artificial Intelligence to Beat Hunger
- UNDP in Asia and the Pacific Appoints World’s First Non-Human Innovation Champion
- Envisioning Zero Hunger
- Artificial Intelligence in Asia and the Pacific
- World Food Program Teams Up with WeRobotics
These are only a few of the ways mobile phones are being used to make the world a better place. Join +SocialGood throughout February as we explore the opportunities mobile technology presents to help progress the Global Goals. Share your thoughts, solutions, and ideas with #SocialGoodTech!
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