Stakeholders Move to Create AI Ecosystem to Boost Productivity

Emma Okonji

Stakeholders in the technology industry, last week, converged in Lagos for the ‘AI in Action Now’ conference, to create an Artificial Intelligence (AI) enabled ecosystem that would drive productivity around solutions that would address specific challenges in Nigeria.

The conference, which attracted over 500 attendees, served as a rallying point for Nigerian innovators to move beyond the passive consumption of global technology to Contextual AI, designed specifically for the Nigerian landscape.

Convener of ‘AI in Action Now’ conference, and CEO, Carbon AI, Debola Ibiyode, stressed the need for an AI Ecosystem that would drive productivity in the Nigerian technology sector.

According to her, “The driving force is to create a chain of productivity among tech founders, tech developers and students in order to learn from each other. So the thing about building an ecosystem that thrives is ensuring that every arm of the ecosystem can be put together in one room. They can all learn from each other, inspire each other, and contribute to each other’s projects in order to move Nigeria forward. AI is an enabler and it will help innovators and solution developers to innovate faster and come up with solutions that will address key challenges, and the best way to achieve this is to build an AI enabled ecosystem.”

In her presentation, Ibiyode emphasised the need for ‘Contextual AI’ adding that the days are gone where people use European products to build for their context. “We should take advantage and get solutions that fit us better and faster. The country that wins will be the one that builds responsibly and scales locally,” Ibiyode said, while challenging the audience to apply local tools to critical sectors such as healthcare and finance, where local nuances like language diversity and unique transaction patterns often render foreign models less effective.

Some experts and tech enthusiasts, who attended the ‘AI in Action Now’ conference, called on AI founders, builders, and students to chart a course for Nigeria’s digital future. They called for local capacity building in the age of Artificial Intelligence, in the face of global tools that dominated the early stages of the AI boom.

Co-founder of AI Nigeria, Dotun Adeoye, who spoke about the adoption of AI in Nigeria, said about 90 per cent of Nigerians were already interacting with AI through tools like ChatGPT or Meta AI, but noted that the business sector of the country is still scratching the surface in the use of AI.
Adeoye highlighted a massive opportunity for investors to optimize local logistics and business operations, and stressed the importance of ethics and human-centric design.

Lagos State Commissioner for Energy and Mineral Resources, Biodun Ogunleye, commended the convener of the conference, adding that data-driven intelligence is now the bedrock of modern administration.

“Without AI, there will be no good governance. The fast adoption of AI will help in managing complex transport networks and optimize revenue collection. AI is no longer a luxury but a necessity for the state,” Ogunleye said.

He further clarified the government’s role as an enabler rather than a competitor. “Government is not in the business of business. We want to partner with the private sector and those with the right structures to deal with data, ensuring results that gladden the populace,” Ogunleye added.