ISTANBUL  -  Federal Minister for Information, Broadcasting, National Heritage and Culture Attaullah Tarar on Friday made a passionate call at an international conference to work out a comprehensive and inclusive AI regulatory framework which is “acceptable to all”. “As the world is progressing with the AI advancement, we must come up with a regulatory framework that upholds ethical standards and works for collective good of humanity which has common goals and objectives,” said the minister while addressing the Startcom Summit 2024.

“We must come together on common terms and make a regulatory framework which is acceptable to all,” he said while advocating for encouraging the positive use of the AI, and discouraging the negative ones.

“What I would like to achieve from AI…in the field of agritech, we would like to have more productivity and high yield crops through inducement of technology because we are rice exporting country and we have the agriculture as a backbone of economy,” he said while underlining the need for AI advancement in education, skill development, fintech and healthtech sectors as well.

“With regard to education and skill development, we would like to see the AI advancement in distance learning so that those students who do not have access to these good universities could gain higher education,” he said, adding the AI should be used in increasing the children enrolment in school, and eradicating the diseases like hepatitis and polio.

He also stressed on the need of using the AI in combating the climate change, bolstering economy and curbing the misinformation and disinformation.

“We just need to make right kind of policies and benefit our people,” he said while pointing out the biggest contemporary challenge in the form of misinformation and disinformation. He cited the World Economic Forum where most of the leaders called misinformation a greatest threat as it led to chaos and anarchy. The minister said the international fora could be used to deal with this challenge and an international agreement could be reached or task force could be established to deal with this challenge that eventually leads to economic instability, security crises that caused destruction beyond imagination.

He also expressed reservation over the censorship of the issue related to Gaza, Kashmir and Lebanon on social media. “AI is being used negatively there, and there is a selective judgement in this regard,” he added.

The minister regretted that he was unable to mention name of martyr Burhan Wani on Social media and use his picture due to what he called “selective judgement”.

The people should be told about the humanitarian crises in Gaza, Kashmir and other countries, he added.

“In Pakistan, we have 111 million Internet users, about 45 per cent of our population. Then, we have 71 million social media users, about 29 per cent of our population and mobile phone users are about 188 million,” he said while highlighting the young population of Pakistan.