National Data Library and AI Opportunities Blueprint

For long, we have been curious, but far too cautious. No longer being Sir Vidiadhar Surajprasad Naipaul’s “Mimic Men,” we have become pensive bystanders of the changes unfolding beneath our feet. Good governance in the Age of Artificial Intelligence (AI) turns on building a National Data Library (NDL).

No nation state today has the soft infrastructure to fully harness AI for public good. The data infrastructure of Trinidad and Tobago, like that of every nation state, is constructed on a platform of worn-out assumptions about how data create value. Today, data remain disjointed, patchy, and unfit for purpose. Public-sector data remain imprisoned in bureaucratic silos.

Access is slow and uneven, and there is no system to connect and use this data effectively, or any framework for deciding what additional data would be most valuable to collect, given the capabilities of AI-assemblages. A National Data Library (NDL) has the potential to become the most sensitive piece of enabling and critical infrastructure for public-service delivery, and e-Commerce growth in Trinidad and Tobago.

It can unlock the full potential of public-sector data by enabling secure, seamless, rapid, and scalable access to linked data lakes and cooperatives. By dissolving curtains to data use, a National Data Library (NDL) can drive AI-enabled innovation, transform public services, and propel the development of solutions to national challenges that are uniquely tailored to the Trinidad and Tobago context.

Incredible change in Trinidad and Tobago will be driven by AI. An AI Opportunities Action Plan is fast becoming a geopolitical imperative.  A National Data Library (NDL) must be placed at the heart of a National AI Plan for Change. Such a plan must stipulate the well-being of all citizens as its overarching goal. This plan has the potential to unleash a Decade of Renewal.

This Decade of Renewal can embrace accelerated planning for essential national AI infrastructure, including an AI Data Embassy Campus, hosting an International AI Investment Summit, and establishing an international technology hub that shares the ambition of the State to roll out AI across Trinidad and Tobago to foster economic growth, and nurture the next generation of technology talent.

An AI Opportunities Action Plan becomes an attractor or receptacle for global AI industry players. The objective is to cultivate an ecology of AI industry players that can flourish in the shade of the AI Data Embassy Campus. The plan must be to make Trinidad and Tobago attractive for investment. This is important if Trinidad and Tobago is to be at the forefront of the Infosphere Revolution in Latin America and the Caribbean, and be a change-maker rather than a change-taker.

While this AI agenda is local, it must iterate and leverage global initiatives. Projects must be scaled globally and align with international forum communities. In essence, the agenda must be “glocal” as it combines international considerations with indigenous working knowledge. The agenda must probe a game-changing bundle of AI Opportunities for national development. This curated bundle of AI Opportunities can become an AI Charter for Change that sketches the Future State of the Republic.

AI can also help develop and drive this AI Plan for Change.  AI can change assessment practices for stackable credentials, address concerns that surround numeracy and literacy, help monitor the Buccoo Reef, advance the ambition of One Patient One Record in health care, modernise the Town and Country Planning application processes, and support a National Statistical Institute with data analysis on population segments, population vulnerabilities, and employment trends. Such a plan can mainstream AI into the arteries of the innovative state and scaffold the rise of more digital citizen-facing services.

The 2025 IMF report, released at the annual Spring meetings in Washington, DC, has underscored that the output gains from the use of AI would not be shared equally across the world. The Fund, therefore, calls on policymakers and AI industry innovators to minimise costs to broader society.

The report states that from 2025 to 2030, AI could enhance global GDP by 0.5% annually. The Fund also emphasizes that the societal acceptability of AI will depend on job roles, with some professions integrating AI into the work stream while others highlight ethical concerns. However, if fully realized, the gains from embedding AI can have enormous economic benefits for Trinidad and Tobago every year over the next decade.

The IMF report suggests that reduced AI usage costs and future technological advancements could boost productivity significantly, and that the integration of AI technologies into workflows could lead to knowledge spillovers across industries and economies, fostering innovation and driving down costs globally. According to the report, these gains could materialise without adverse effects on employment if AI adoption is accompanied by plans and policies that upgrade regulatory frameworks and labour legislation.

This makes the AI Action Plan a part of the Industrial Strategy of the State, and a plank of the National AI Transformation and Cybersecurity Sector Plan. The hope is that these gains can be realized without power price hikes and costs to the planet. This requires policymakers and captains of industry to collaborate, embrace, and incentivise renewable energy sources and to introduce state-of-the-art production paradigms.