The ICT Minister, Mauricio Lizcano, participated on September 22 in a space organized by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) on artificial intelligence (AI) for sustainable development. In this round table, it was discussed how this technology can support the achievement and fulfillment of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). During the day, the following topics were presented: the AI4SD platform, developed by this programme and the United Arab Emirates.
“From the ICT Ministry, our strategies to take advantage of artificial intelligence in research, productive development taking advantage of this technology, democratization and training of one million Colombians with limited resources in digital fields. These actions are aimed especially at the less favored communities, and are part of the strategy with which we want to turn Colombia into a digital power,” said the ICT Minister, Mauricio Lizcano.
Before representatives of the governments of the United Arab Emirates, Singapore, Egypt and Italy, among others, the ICT Minister explained that Colombia leads AI innovation in Latin America through the National Digital Strategy 2023-2026. This work includes the establishment of two large artificial intelligence development centers in Zipaquira and Bogotaand 70 PotencIA Centers for learning about this technology throughout the country. The focus of these spaces is economic development, social inclusion and sustainable growth, with the goal of reducing barriers to digital transformation through collaborative training and experimentation.
In addition, through the ‘PotencIA’ initiative, the aim is to strengthen innovation ecosystems and promote the Regional development through AIfocusing on technological transformation with an emphasis on social inclusion and sustainability. To this end, the head of the ICT portfolio pointed out that some key sectors were identified for the implementation of this strategy, such as health, agriculture, education, security, logistics, tourism and environment.
During his visit to New York City, Minister Lizcano was asked about the careers that young people should study in the face of new challenges, with artificial intelligence consolidated.
“I’m going to give you this fact, which may be revealing and frightening, if you can say it like that, but it’s true. In 2030, that is, in six years, 65 percent of the jobs we have today will disappear,” he said.
“It’s not that there will be a lot of unemployment, it’s that there will be new jobs that will emerge. That is a debate that has always existed with technology. In Colombia we have 270 thousand vacancies for people who know how to program,” he added.
In Latin America, 2.1 million jobs are required in these areas. And in the world, 60 million jobs are needed. with topics related to artificial intelligence. This is not just me saying it, it is said by a study by Price Waterhouse Cooper that has just been published. The topics that are most in demand are: Python, which is the world’s programming languageeverything to do with the data analyticsMachine learning, artificial intelligence, cloud computing and blockchain are the topics that should be included in undergraduate courses,” he explained.
Regarding the ethics and regulation of AI, Minister Lizcano highlighted that Colombia is proactively addressing the challenges it brings, Strengthening data privacy laws and promoting ethics and the development of comprehensive regulatory policies to ensure the responsible and sustainable adoption of this technology across all sectors. Some of these actions include strengthening data privacy through Law 1581 of 2012 (Data Protection Law), CONPES Document 3975 of 2019 or the National Policy for Digital Transformation and Artificial Intelligence, which lays the foundations for the governance of this technology in Colombia, and the National Roadmap (published in 2024) that provides updated strategies for sustainable and ethical AI.
“In terms of enablers, we are working on data, organizing and articulating sectors to become producers of these,” the minister added.
