In many African AI deployments, system requirements are defined by international technical partners or funders, often without fully understanding the day-to-day realities of use. This leads to design choices—like requiring high-speed internet, English-only interfaces, or complex interfaces—that make tools ineffective or even harmful.
This webinar looks at how requirement setting should function as a bridge between vision and use: Aligning system features with cultural context, infrastructure gaps, and social expectations; Identifying constraints early on—connectivity, literacy, consent, power dynamics—and building around them and making conscious trade-offs between speed, scale, and equity.
The African AI & Equality Toolbox is a strategic initiative designed to empower African stakeholders—policymakers, technologists, civil society actors, and communities—to shape Artificial Intelligence (AI) systems that are contextually relevant, inclusive, and grounded in human rights.
Developed by Women at the Table and the African Centre for Technology Studies (ACTS), and adapted from the global AI & Equality Human Rights Toolbox Initiative in collaboration with the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), this African iteration provides practical tools and methodologies to guide equitable AI development across the continent.
The Toolbox applies a Human Rights-based AI Lifecycle Framework, integrating reflective questions and the Human Rights Impact Assessment (HRIA) developed with the Alan Turing Institute. It emphasizes participatory, multidisciplinary approaches and is rooted in feminist, decolonial, and Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (JEDI) principles and incorporates lessons from emerging digital rights challenges, ensuring AI systems are designed with safety and dignity at their core.
1PM GMT | 3PM SAST | 4PM EAT