The Israeli ambassador to Nigeria, Michael Freeman, has declared the country’s readiness to strengthen its partnership with Nigeria in bolstering artificial intelligence applications globally.

Mr Freeman disclosed this during the closing ceremony of the maiden Innovation Week organised by the Embassy for the Innovation Fellowship for Aspiring Inventors and Researchers programme participants on Thursday in Abuja.

The event is designed to help participants build capacity as innovators, startup founders, researchers, and entrepreneurs in innovation and AI-driven business development. The event began on June 1.

“What we have done today is to ensure that the more you use AI, the more there will be a Nigerian voice and an African voice in AI, and the more AI will be useful to people across the continent.

“We have not done this before. This is the first time that we have gone out with AI because the Israeli government has made a decision to go all in on AI.

“This is to become one of the world leaders in AI within the next few years, and we have made a decision that we want to share that knowledge where we can with Nigeria, primarily through the iFAIR programme and other places,” he said.

He explained the initiative was designed to enhance expertise in AI and ensure a better future, not only for Israelis but also for Nigerians.

Mr Freeman added that the only way to achieve that objective would be by deepening the Israel-Nigeria partnership.

This, according to him, is achieved by focusing on utilising AI to increase human application capacity, streamline job operations, and increase creativity in workplaces.

Dor Yaacov, AI lead facilitator from Unistream, an Israeli non-profit organisation focused on entrepreneurship development, said AI applications could enable Africans to develop sustainable solutions tailored to tackling local challenges.

He commended the participants for demonstrating that Nigerian entrepreneurs could lead in developing AI-driven solutions capable of tackling not only local challenges but also global ones.

Mr Yaacov said, “This week, we met warm, smart, and very creative people who are not just talking about problems but want to solve challenges in their daily lives.

“Challenges in education, health, agriculture, sustainability, security and community development. These are real challenges for millions of people around the world, which is why we will hear about startups from Nigeria that solve problems for millions of people soon.”

(NAN)