Doing good with emerging technologies

Artificial intelligence, machine learning and data analytics are increasingly being used to drive the social good, reports Shivani Shinde

While technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) have become part of many aspects of our daily lives in recent times, they are increasingly being used for the social good as well.

Take the case of the Foundation to Educate Girls Globally (FEGG), a not-for-profit organisation that aims to find solutions to enrollment and learning gaps in primary education. The foundation identifies girls who are out of school, enrols them and makes sure that they continue going to school.

FEGG, which has been in existence for more than a decade, collects data on out-of-school girls by conducting door-to-door surveys at the village level. For the last two years, it has taken the help of IDinsights, a global data analytics and research organisation, to use AI and ML for this exercise.

Since then, the accuracy of identification of the villages that have the highest number of girls out of school has gone up by over 80 per cent.

"In 2015 we launched the world's first development impact bond, where, with IDinsights, we used tech to conduct impact evaluation. After that we realised that we can use AI for identifying potential villages with a high number of girls out of school,” says Maharshi Vaishnav, FEGG's chief operating officer.