Swiss President Parmelin endorses India’s drive to democratise AI

Switzerland fully supports India’s efforts to democratise artificial intelligence and welcomes the AI Impact summit’s focus to ensure that the potential of critical technologies must benefit every nation, Swiss President Guy Parmelin said on Wednesday.

In an interview to PTI, Parmelin backed cross-border flow of data saying it is crucial to exploit the potential benefits from digital technologies like artificial intelligence but at the same time pitched for a set of principles and rules to protect data sovereignty of nations.Switzerland is likely to host the next edition of the AI summit.

“Switzerland very much welcomes the focus of the AI Impact summit, which is to work towards making sure that everyone in the world can benefit from the potential of AI, and that no one is left behind,” Parmelin said.

“The principles established by the summit in India in this regard provide useful guidance, and the structures for voluntary cooperation established in New Delhi provide structure that can help us achieve this goal,” he said.

The Swiss president is among around 20 global leaders attending the ongoing AI Impact summit in New Delhi that is largely being seen as an evolving international goal to strengthen cooperation on the governance, safety, and societal impact of artificial intelligence.He also addressed concerns over possible impact of AI on developing countries especially on challenges to protect their labour markets from ‘AI-driven dumping’.

“When AI significantly reduces production costs in high-wage countries, exports can become so cheap that they put pressure on labour markets in developing countries, even without classic dumping,” Parmelin said.“Such shocks can be mitigated through trade policy. Clear investigation procedures and sunset clauses are important in order to avoid the implementation of harmful, permanent protection measures,” he noted.

The Swiss president, delving into the debate on ‘data sovereignty’ laws versus the concept of ‘free flow of data’, pitched for rules that can create fair conditions for all stakeholders in the global AI landscape.

“Switzerland is convinced that international cooperation and the cross-border flow of data are crucial for us all if we want to benefit from the potential that digital technologies like AI offer,” he said.

“In order for this to work, we need a set of principles and rules that help us to respect each others’ sovereignty and that create the necessary trust and fair conditions for all to participate.” Parmelin said Switzerland is willing to work constructively to build a trustworthy framework for AI.

At the same time, he said AI cannot be “regulated” by one single instrument, but there is a need to develop a governance framework consisting of many instruments covering different aspects of the development and use of AI. “Switzerland is therefore actively contributing to the development of technical standards for AI, of binding and nonbinding legal instruments, like the recommendations of UNESCO or the Global Partnership on AI (GPAI) and the Council of Europe framework convention on AI, which has been elaborated among 55 countries from all around the world and is the first binding international treaty on AI,” he said.

“But we also need societal and cultural norms that guide us when using AI in our specific contexts.” The Swiss president said Switzerland “fully share and support India’s and other countries’ efforts to democratise AI”. “Switzerland has created an initiative to share and pool computing resources across countries and stakeholders that have limited resources in the ‘International Computation and AI Network’ (ICAIN).”

Just a few months ago, the Swiss AI research community presented the ‘apertus’ language model which has been trained in over a thousand languages and will help many cultures with fewer resources and data to develop their own language models, appropriate for their own needs, he said.Parmelin, on broader India-Switzerland ties, said relations between the two countries are “excellent”.

“There is potential for growth in various areas, and my visit also serves to explore these opportunities. Our economic relations are based on complementary industrial strengths, which allow Switzerland and India to cooperate very effectively,” he said.

“Switzerland mainly exports machinery, pharmaceutical and chemical products, precision instruments, medical technology, and watches, while importing chemicals, textiles, electronics, and other industrial goods from India,” he added. (PTI )