Developing countries can secure the biggest benefits from Artificial Intelligence (AI) by adapting existing tools to local needs rather than spending billions of dollars on building advanced systems from scratch, says the World Bank’s World Development Report 2026.
The report urged governments to focus on affordable AI applications, strengthen infrastructure and skills, and expand solutions that demonstrate results in public services.
“Adapting AI tools to local contexts, without spending billions of dollars creating advanced AI systems from scratch, will deliver the biggest benefits,” it said.
Highlighting an example from India, the report said AI-supported weather forecasts reached more than 30 million farmers, providing most with advance predictions of the rainy season earlier than ever before.
It also cited applications in other developing countries. In Kenya, the judiciary used a predictive AI algorithm to allocate more than 10,000 court cases annually among over 1,500 mediators, helping reduce the backlog. In Bangladesh, AI-generated medical imaging increased the number of patients screened daily for a complication of diabetes by 39.5 per cent.
The report noted that many substantial gains came from predictive AI used in the back-end operations of public services, even as attention remained focused on generative AI for frontline service delivery.
However, adopting technology developed elsewhere would not be sufficient without adapting it to local conditions.
“AI is context-specific and adopting AI from abroad will not be sufficient,” it said.
The report also indicated that the risk of job disruption was less imminent in developing countries, where a smaller share of jobs was amenable to AI use than in advanced economies.
It cautioned that AI’s benefits would be slow to materialise without foundational support, including electricity, internet access and skills. Businesses also identified a lack of information as an important barrier to adopting or expanding AI solutions.
For governments, the report recommended providing infrastructure and skills for small AI investments and using public procurement to expand effective solutions. It called for frameworks to procure, evaluate and scale up AI pilots amid limited reliable evidence on what works.
On regulation, the report said to start with voluntary standards and flexible rules, building upon existing laws to develop trustworthy AI. It also advocated interoperable AI systems to manage dependency risks arising from the concentration of leading AI-related companies in the United States and China. – ANI
