PH in the AI Race: A Failure of Ambition

I keep hearing that our problem is a lack of good ideas. I don’t believe that. I think our real problem is something else. It is a failure of ambition.

Around the world, other countries are moving fast. They see what is coming, and they act. They do not wait for perfect plans or long debates. They start, they learn, and they scale.

In 2019, Finland made a bold choice. They decided to train 1% of their entire population in artificial intelligence. That is not a small pilot. That is a national goal. And they did it in one year. Not ten. Not five. One year. Now they are helping train 1% of the whole European Union.

When AI tools became popular in 2023, Dubai made another big move. They said they would train one million prompt engineers. Think about that. Dubai has only about four million people. That means one out of every four people would learn how to work with AI. That is not cautious thinking. That is ambition.

In China, the signal is also clear. AI education companies do not pay taxes. AI research companies do not pay taxes. The message is simple: if you are building the future, we will support you.

I share these examples not to praise other countries, but to make a point. The ideas are not rare. The playbook is not secret. What is missing is the will to act at scale.

Here at home, we talk a lot. We talk about protecting jobs. We talk about passing big, complex bills that try to solve everything at once. We talk about risks, rules, and roadblocks. All of that matters. But while we talk, the world moves.

I do not think we need more studies to tell us that AI will change work. We already know that. We do not need another panel to say that skills matter. We know that too. What we need is action that matches the size of the moment.

We once did this before. The BPO industry did not grow by accident. It started with clear support from government. There were tax shields. There were rules that made it easier to invest. People took a risk. Today, that industry makes up about 8% of our GDP. That did not happen because we were afraid. It happened because we were bold.

Why can’t we do the same for AI?

Years ago, a proposal was raised to train one million Filipinos in AI. That idea is still good. In fact, it is even more urgent now. AI is no longer something far away. It is already here. It is changing how we write, code, design, sell, and decide.

Some people worry that AI will take jobs. I worry more about what happens if we do nothing. If we do not train our people, others will. If we do not prepare our workers, companies will look elsewhere. Standing still is also a choice, and it is a dangerous one.

We keep saying we want to protect industries. But real protection does not come from walls. It comes from skills. It comes from making our people valuable in a changing world. Training one million people in AI is not just an education program. It is an economic strategy.

This does not need to be complicated. We do not need one massive law that tries to fix everything. There is room for simple, focused action. A bill that funds AI training. A program that supports AI startups. Clear incentives that say, “Build here. Learn here. Grow here.”

Ambition is not about being reckless. It is about being honest about the future. The future will not wait for us to feel comfortable. Other countries have accepted that. They are acting with speed and confidence.

We can do the same. We have smart people. We have strong workers. We have young minds that learn fast. What we lack is not talent. It is the courage to think big.

Failure is not failing to predict the future. Failure is seeing it clearly and choosing not to act. If we keep moving slowly while the world runs ahead, history will not say we lacked ideas. It will say we lacked ambition.

And that is a failure we can still choose to fix.

 

 

About Me:

Dominic “Doc” Ligot is one of the leading voices in AI in the Philippines. Doc has been extensively cited in local and global media outlets including The Economist, South China Morning Post, Washington Post, and Agence France Presse. His award-winning work has been recognized and published by prestigious organizations such as NASA, Data.org, Digital Public Goods Alliance, the Group on Earth Observations (GEO), the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the World Health Organization (WHO), and UNICEF.

If you need guidance or training in maximizing AI for your career or business, reach out to Doc via https://docligot.com.

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