Google, World Bank Tie-Up To Build AI-Powered Public Digital Infrastructure In Emerging Markets

Google and the World Bank Group are collaborating to build AI-powered public digital infrastructure for emerging markets, the search engine giant announced on its official blog.

A pro bono pilot project for this initiative ran in Uttar Pradesh that helped thousands of smallholder farmers increase profitability, Google said.

By combining Google Cloud's AI technology, including its Gemini models, with the World Bank Group's development expertise, the initiative helps governments quickly create interoperable networks for critical sectors like agriculture, healthcare and skilling, Google said on its blog.

"Resilience is embedded at the beginning, it is not added later. Heat-tolerant seeds, soil-matched fertilisers, rejuvenation techniques, efficient irrigation, and strong insurance and financing underpin so that a bad season doesn't become a bad year, doesn't become a bad life," World Bank Group President Ajay Banga said.

He said digital is the glue that holds the system together - small AI tools and basic phones that can diagnose crop disease from a photograph, that can inform fertilizer choices, it can prompt action well ahead of a weather event and move payments securely, which then becomes a credit history.

"A couple of months ago, I was in India in Uttar Pradesh. I saw all this come together, the foundation, the cooperatives, the resilience, and most importantly, the glue that held it together, the digital system, and it delivered. Proof of concept is it works, and now we need to scale it, and it is scalable," Banga said, adding they want to replicate wherever possible.

We're scaling up our support to reshape the future of food. Helping smallholders boost productivity, linking them to value chains, & protecting their land. Watch the #WBGMeetings AgriConnect event replay: https://t.co/MKhQSmH6pK pic.twitter.com/BPJ0gIykzi

— World Bank (@WorldBank) October 16, 2025

Citizens can interact with these AI-powered services in over 40 languages, even on simple devices, Google said.

Google.org is providing funding to the new nonprofit Networks for Humanity (NFH) to build universal digital infrastructure, establish regional innovation labs and pilot social impact applications globally.

Google will invest $15 billion over the next five years in setting up an AI hub in India, which will include the country's largest data centre in partnership with Adani Group. The AI hub at Visakhapatnam in Andhra Pradesh will be Google's largest outside the US and will include 1-gigawatt data centre campus, new large-scale energy sources, and an expanded fiber optic network.

(Disclaimer: New Delhi Television is a subsidiary of AMG Media Networks Limited, an Adani Group Company.)