Infrastructure as policy: Building the compute power for a digitized economy

The conversation around Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Nigeria often focuses on “applications,” but the economic reality is that AI requires “compute.” To alleviate poverty through technology, Nigeria must address its “compute deficit.”

Policy must pivot from simply consuming global AI products to building the domestic infrastructure such as Data Centers and High-Performance Computing (HPC) clusters which are critical factors to that will energize our digital future.

A deep dive into the global technological landscape shows that “Compute Power” is the new oil. Without localized data processing, Nigerian firms are forced to pay “data rents” to foreign cloud providers, leading to a constant drain on our foreign exchange.

A national “AI Infrastructure Policy” should provide tax incentives for the establishment of green data centers, utilizing Nigeria’s vast solar potential. This is not just a tech-sector win; it is a macroeconomic necessity.

Furthermore, “Data Sovereignty” is an essential component of poverty alleviation. AI models trained on ‘foreign’ data often fail to understand the nuances of the Nigerian market—the informal credit systems of “Ajo” or “isusu” for instance.

By building domestic compute power, we create the necessary requirement for the development of “hyper-local” AI models that can solve our unique productivity blocks. For the decision-maker, the message is clear: the road to poverty alleviation is paved with silicon.

.Okeke is a technology governance and public policy advocate. He is the founder of AEO Foundation.