AI can empower India’s farmers, says World Bank chief

• Ajay Banga says “small AI” can help farmers and workers in developing countries improve productivity without immediate large-scale job losses

• In Uttar Pradesh, an AI tool helps women farmers identify crop diseases using basic mobile phones and recommends treatments

• Banga says LLMs could affect about one-third of jobs in developed countries, but far fewer in middle- and low-income nations

Artificial intelligence (AI) could significantly improve the lives of farmers and other workers in India and other developing countries without creating the same immediate job-displacement risks seen in advanced economies, World Bank president Ajay Banga has said.

Speaking at a discussion moderated by CNN’s Fareed Zakaria at Columbia University, Banga highlighted the potential of what he called “small AI” — predictive tools designed to improve productivity in areas such as agriculture, education, skilling and healthcare.

As an example, he pointed to an AI initiative launched in Uttar Pradesh in collaboration with Google, which is helping women farmers identify crop diseases using basic mobile phones.

Banga said the programme connects women farmers associated with cooperatives to an application that does not require advanced technical skills. A farmer can speak into a 3G phone and use its camera to photograph a diseased plant leaf. The application can then identify the disease and recommend a suitable insecticide available through the local cooperative.

“So, we give them a tool that she can speak into a 3G phone, point the camera at the back of a leaf of a diseased plant, and it spits back at you that disease, this insecticide for 25 Rupees from your local cooperative,” Banga said.

He described the technology as a way of “democratizing” access to specialised knowledge for farmers who may otherwise have limited access to agricultural expertise.

Banga argued that the AI debate in advanced economies is largely centred on large language models (LLMs) and generative AI, which require substantial computing power, energy, data, skilled personnel and capital.

“These are five things” that are scarce in many emerging economies, he said, adding that even developed countries face challenges in providing the computing and energy infrastructure required to operate large AI systems at scale.

Instead, he said developing countries could benefit more immediately from smaller, targeted AI applications that address specific problems.

“What's really an opportunity there is what we call small AI, which is predictive tools used to improve the productivity of farmer, of better education and skilling, or of improved capabilities in healthcare,” Banga said.

Banga also offered a contrasting assessment of AI’s potential impact on employment across economies at different income levels.

He said that in developed economies, large language models could potentially affect around one-third of jobs. In middle-income countries, however, the proportion could fall to single digits, while he suggested the immediate impact could be negligible in low-income countries.

His argument is that developing economies still have significant scope to use AI to raise productivity and expand economic opportunities before widespread displacement becomes a major concern.

The discussion also underlined the different challenges facing advanced economies, where AI and robotics could put pressure on established white-collar and manufacturing jobs.

Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, who appeared alongside Banga, cited the legal profession as an example, noting that AI can increasingly handle research and documentation work traditionally assigned to younger lawyers.

Mitsotakis said the combination of AI-driven disruption in white-collar employment and robotics affecting manufacturing could leave sections of the middle class in developed countries with fewer opportunities.

“If you ... have AI going after the white collar jobs, and robotics going after what's left of the manufacturing jobs that doesn't really leave ... a lot of room for optimism regarding the future,” he said.

Banga’s remarks therefore frame AI not only as a potential source of disruption but also as an opportunity for developing economies to use targeted, low-cost applications to address longstanding gaps in access to knowledge, skills and essential services.

With IANS inputs