Surprise! Blocking Mobile Internet Access Makes People Happier, Healthier, and More Focused

I've spent over a decade advocating for mobile phone access as a pathway to development. Like many in our community, I firmly believed that connecting everyone to smartphones and mobile internet was an unqualified good. But groundbreaking research has shaken my confidence in this assumption—and should shake yours too. Our push for universal smartphone adoption might be making people worse off!

https://www.ictworks.org/surprise-blocking-mobile-internet-access/

UK Just Quietly Did to Aid What Trump Did Loudly. Yet Nobody is Screaming

When this USA administration dismantled USAID, people noticed. Courts intervened. Senators held hearings. Aid workers went on television. The chaos was loud, and the resistance was proportional. When the UK's Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office quietly published its multi-year ODA allocations recently, it got roughly 15 seconds on Channel 4 news. That same day, a COVID inquiry and a meningitis outbreak in Kent competed for the headlines.

https://www.ictworks.org/uk-just-quietly-did-what-trump-did-loudly/

Apply Now: £200,000 for Your Digital Inclusion Solutions

Three billion people — 38% of the world's population — experience the digital divide daily. They live within mobile broadband coverage but remain offline, blocked by barriers like device affordability, unreliable electricity, and limited digital skills. In Africa alone, 960 million people have coverage but don't use mobile internet, while 80% of mobile towers in off-grid and weak-grid areas…

https://www.ictworks.org/apply-now-200000-for-your-digital-inclusion-solutions/

African Citizen Digital Health Data Is Now a Condition of Global Health Funding

The conversation we've been having about digital sovereignty just became concrete with the America First Global Health Strategy. The United States had signed 26 bilateral health Memorandum of Understanding with African governments under the Trump administration's America First Global Health Strategy, the framework that replaced USAID and restructured PEPFAR. All the African MOUs signed so far involve the U.S. winding down previous support for African countries' priority health programmes, particularly PEPFAR support for HIV and tuberculosis, while making access to information about dangerous pathogens a priority.

http://www.ictworks.org/african-digital-health-data-global-health-funding/

Gender Productivity Paradox: Artificial Intelligence Is Failing Women

We are witnessing a significant disconnect in modern development economics. While AI promises unprecedented productivity gains, with forecasts of adding $19.9 trillion to the global economy by 2030, we're simultaneously creating a gender productivity paradox. The more AI boosts overall economic output, the wider gender disparities become in income, time allocation, and economic agency. Sign Up Now for more digital divide insights 

https://www.ictworks.org/gender-productivity-paradox/

Apply Now: $30 Million to Improve Government Services with Artificial Intelligence

The global market for artificial intelligence in government is projected to grow from $22 billion to nearly $100 billion by 2033, yet most developing countries have no AI initiatives in their public sectors. A recent OECD assessment found that 75% of surveyed Southeast Asian nations have zero government AI use cases, even as research shows broad AI adoption could reduce federal deficits by up to 22% and boost GDP by up to 4% in developing economies.

https://www.ictworks.org/improve-government-services/

AI Preparedness Index Shows Global South Is Not Ready for Artificial Intelligence Soltuions

The IMF's AI Preparedness Index destroys the comfortable fiction that Global South countries are "leapfrogging" into AI readiness. While development practitioners debate which chatbot to deploy in refugee camps or which machine learning model to pilot for crop prediction, the Index reveals that most Global South countries lack the foundational infrastructure to make any of this work sustainably. We're building AI castles on digital sand.

https://www.ictworks.org/ai-preparedness-index-shows-global-south-is-not-ready-for-artificial-intelligence-soltuions/

Apply Now: $60 Million to Evaluate AI Decision Support Tools for Frontline Health Workers

The evidence crisis in artificial intelligence for health is stark. AI-powered triage assistants, diagnostic aids, and LLM-based symptom checkers are being deployed from Kenya to Myanmar — but without rigorous local evidence. Of 86 randomized clinical trials on AI health tools conducted globally between 2018 and 2023, only four took place in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) — the settings where overburdened community health workers and primary care clinicians arguably need decision support most.

https://www.ictworks.org/funding-evaluate-ai-decision-support-tools/

India Just Proved A Better Way to Build AgriTech Solutions

How many AgriTech solutions promise to revolutionize smallholder farming with comprehensive digital advisory platforms? The formula is always the same: aspirational technology like sleek mobile apps, blockchain supply chains, or AI chatbots offering advice on everything from soil health to market prices. Subscribe Now for more agritech insights These ideas are piloted with a few thousand farmers, publish glowing case studies, and then quietly struggle to reach beyond 50,000 users.

https://www.ictworks.org/better-way-to-build-agritech-solutions/

Direct-to-Cell Satellite Internet Is a Key Humanitarian Connectivity Tool

The ICT4D community continuously debates how to connect the unconnected. We've argued about spectrum allocation, community networks, and whether Starlink is extractive. Those are important conversations. But while we debate, governments are getting better at weaponizing the off switch. Access Now documented 296 internet shutdowns across 54 countries in 2024, a 35% increase in the number of countries affected compared to 2022.

https://www.ictworks.org/direct-to-cell-satellite-internet-humanitarian-connectivity-tool/