The Future of AI for Development

What will Cambodia’s digital future look like as Artificial Intelligence becomes a daily tool in classrooms, ministries, and enterprises? How will farmers, SMEs, and public institutions change the way they work, decide, and deliver services? What kind of skills, safeguards, and leadership will matter most as AI adoption accelerates?

The answers to these questions and many more are brought together in Digital Insights, a two part publication by Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung Cambodia and the Cambodia Academy of Digital Technology that is designed as a policy relevant contribution to Cambodia’s national conversation on digital development. At its center is a practical framing of AI as an enabling tool for socio economic development, with a deliberate focus on concrete applications in sectors that matter for long term growth, and an explicit goal of bridging technological possibility with policy action.

The publication is grounded in Cambodia’s current transformation moment, where connectivity and infrastructure gains are opening space for a more vibrant digital economy, and where AI offers opportunities to accelerate progress in education, public health, SMEs, and agriculture. It also reflects an institutional commitment to applied research and talent development, and situates Cambodia’s recent completion of UNESCO’s AI Readiness Assessment as a milestone that supports ethical, inclusive, human centered digital transformation and contributes to the drafting of a national AI strategy.

This edition also captures how quickly AI has moved from abstract debate into everyday routines since the rapid diffusion of generative AI from November 2022, including tools such as ChatGPT. Rather than relying on slogans, Cambodia chose a diagnostic approach through UNESCO’s AI Readiness Assessment Methodology, concluding in early July 2025 with inputs from 26 ministries, and feeding into a draft National AI Strategy that is explicit about gaps in data, compute, and talent while still insisting that AI should serve economic transformation.

Across the volume, case based insights show how AI can strengthen agriculture through resource optimization and risk management, support SME competitiveness through efficiency and innovation, and improve public administration through service modernization and transparency, while underscoring that safeguards and ethical frameworks must be in place. The overarching message is clear: AI adoption is not simply a technology choice, it is a strategic imperative tied to competitiveness, new economic opportunities, and sustainable development.