Stay with me. This is a meandering article about economic development, to Gaza, to truck drivers, to logistics. The common thread is artificial intelligence (AI). It just takes me a while to get to the point.
I was recently speaking on data integration for economic development organizations and was struck by how much data was out there, but largely pocketed because of county lines, different industries, etc. The point of my speech was that artificial intelligence can be used to act as the connective application that integrates data, whether it’s for MLS listing, zoning changes, or labor movement. AI can take large data sets to identify trends and insights to help make informed decisions easier.
A couple of days later, I read a CNN article “The near-impossible task of providing food aid in Gaza” (FN1). The aid workers are performing incredibly, labor-intensive work. They are putting their lives at risk. Between my speech, reading the CNN article, and one of my earlier comments in a prior article (FN2) on” how do we help hero’s do their job”, I started to think about AI for humanitarian aid.
CAN AI HELP HUMANITARIAN AID FROM A LOGISTICS PERSPECTIVE
One of my first jobs as a new lawyer a long (long) time ago was analyzing transportation regulations. Byzantine to say the least. Back then, shipping documents had to be faxed to the next location, and the client never really knew where the shipment was, much less the truck. When GPS and satellite positioning started to be used, I remember quite a few truck drivers complaining that it was terrible as they felt it was spying on them.
Fast forward to now. The drivers have probably gotten over their privacy concerns. We now have the possibility to get everything from weather to traffic patterns, to accident alerts. Could all of this data be integrated to help humanitarian aid? Maybe it is happening, but what may not be happening is the over layering of drone and satellite imagery information as well as local law enforcement data. Maybe what is not happening is the real time coordination and sharing of information between humanitarian aid organizations (FN3).
Could AI as the data integrator (if you were paying attention, I mentioned AI as the data integrator in the first paragraph) help optimize humanitarian aid? Could AI chatbots and mobile applications be developed to help facilitate information sharing and coordination among aid agencies? I believe so.
Through massive data scraping of everything from satellite imagery, to shipment tracking, to travel time, perhaps AI could be used to optimize everything from delivery schedules to fuel consumption to rerouting delivery based on inventory. It is already possible to track and trace everything from water to medical supplies. To layer in real time information, humanitarian efforts can proactively make speedier decisions from route optimization to personnel allocation. AI can also sift and sort using natural language technology (NLP) to process and analyze vast amounts of unstructured data (think social media posts and chats to help identify emerging crises, predict population movements, and recommend targeted responses in conflict areas) (FN4).
Beyond the logistics possibilities, maybe AI can help enhance threat detection systems (I keep thinking of big men wearing camo and dark glasses with guns) to monitor and secure aid convoys, warehouses, and distribution centers in conflict areas.
While logistics is just one small part of humanitarian efforts, it is a critical one.
FOOTNOTES:
FN1: https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/24/opinions/aid-gaza-struggle-israel-war-kennedy
FN3: https://knowledge.insead.edu/operations/planning-matters-coordination-humanitarian-relief
FN4: https://www.ibm.com/topics/natural-language-processing
About the author
Gary Sumihiro is the founder of Sumihiro Investments, LLC a global strategic consulting firm whose clients range from 5G to clean energy. Learn more at www.sumihiroinvestmentsllc.com.
PS: Talk to Chris Medina about his company nureal.ai. He speaks tech language and is far smarter about AI than I am.