The Importance of Technological Progression in Impoverished Countries

Abstract

In mid-2023, United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres warned that almost 80 years following the end of World War Two, “the global financial architecture is outdated, dysfunctional, and unjust. It is no longer capable of meeting the needs of the 21st-century world: a multipolar world characterized by deeply integrated economies and financial markets. But also marked by geopolitical tensions and growing systemic risks.” Further, the Secretary-General cautioned that “the current global financial system exacerbates inequalities, denying the poorest countries the credit and debt support they need and deserve”. We address the question: How does the transfer of modern technologies improve the economic development of impoverished nations? In this paper we demonstrate that rapid technological change is a double-edged sword—bringing significant productivity gains and economic progress while also causing profound societal disruptions and posing a threat of political instability in parts of the world. Nevertheless, we believe that a rapid and sustained transfer of these technologies holds great promise for the rapid development of today’s less developed nations.

1. Introduction

Humanity faces a crisis of world hunger and poverty. Over just the last few years, the COVID-19 pandemic resulted in severe loss of life, economic stress, and supply chain disruptions (World Bank, 2020), the war in Ukraine caused enhanced food insecurity for millions, climate change continues to cause natural disasters and agricultural disruption and other adverse developments have contributed to political instability and threatened world resources needed to assist the least fortunate among us. In this paper, we discuss the root causes and recent developments contributing to world poverty and fragility in the global financial system and examine the promises offered by rapid technological advances and novel challenges (and opportunities) created by the same disruptive technologies.

Our paper proceeds as follows. First, we discuss global poverty. Second, we look at how climate change is contributing to food insecurity and world poverty. Third, we examine global food insecurity. Fourth, we discuss the promise of technology in reducing global poverty. Fifth, the challenges brought by rapid technological advances are considered. Sixth, the problem of multinational criminal organizations, illicit drug trade, bribery, and corruption is discussed. Seventh, the role of the United Nations and other multinational organizations is discussed. We conclude that this paper contributes an improved understanding of how technological advances hold potential for substantial transformation of the economies of less developed nations suffering from poverty. In the coming decades, humanity’s challenge is to ensure that the new technologies are rapidly shared with the less developed nations so that all the nations of the world benefit from these, and the prosperity of all people is enhanced. The paper addresses the question: “How does the use of modern technologies contribute to reducing poverty in developing countries?”

2. The Global Poverty Problem

2.1. Poverty Defined and Measured

Poverty is defined by economists in terms of household income. If the income is below a certain threshold—the poverty line—a family is considered poor. The poverty line varies across the globe and changes over time as prices rise (inflation). The World Bank defines the “international poverty line” to be around $1.90 per day for a family or household, using the measure across the countries. “Extreme poverty is measured as the number of people living on less than $1.90 per day.” This has sometimes been translated in popular literature to a “two dollars a day” threshold, below which a family is considered to be in “extreme poverty. The new global poverty lines of $2.15, $3.65, and $6.85 reflect the typical national poverty lines of low-income, lower-middle-income, and upper-middle-income countries in 2017 prices.” In 2025, the estimates of global poverty have been adjusted by the World Bank. The new estimates reflect newer data on prices and national poverty lines for over 160 nations. On a positive note, these adjustments demonstrate that more people have escaped the curse of “extreme poverty” in recent decades than we thought. As a result of the new information, the international poverty lines have also been adjusted. The new poverty line stands at $3.00 per day (in 2021 prices) for nations in extreme poverty; at $4.20 per day (in 2021 prices) for lower-middle-income countries, and $8.30 per day (2021 prices) for upper-middle-income countries (https://blogs.worldbank.org/en/opendata/the-world-bank-s-new-global-poverty-lines-in-2021-prices, accessed on 5 October 2025).

The World Bank (WB) further observes that “People living below the poverty line don’t have enough to meet their basic needs.” The trends in global poverty have been negative, with improvements in living standards across the globe and hundreds of millions of citizens graduating from extreme poverty in places like China, Vietnam, and Bangladesh despite the COVID-19 pandemic, which, in the short run, caused a serious disruption in these long-term trends.

2.2. Negative Impact of Continued Global Poverty

Poverty and hunger lead to reduced human productivity and usually result in an enormous loss in national and global economic wellbeing and potential. According to Mohammed Yunus, the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize laureate, “poverty means being deprived of all human value” (Nobel Peace Prize, 2006). Mr. Yunus believes that it is the economic system we have created and the assumptions we make that contribute to global poverty and recommends that strategies to escape poverty such as “access to institutional capital” should be considered a basic human right. He is a firm believer that poor households have the capabilities to use credit responsibility to invest in small business to improve their lives, leaving poverty behind.

2.3. Trends in Prevalence of Global Poverty

During the three decades before Xi Jinping became Chairman, powered by China’s move from communism to a more liberal and free market economy and technology such as the Internet which has connected and informed people across the globe, hundreds of millions have escaped poverty. However, the COVID-19 pandemic has seriously disrupted these positive trends. It remains to be seen how the national and international economies will recover from this setback and whether the previous trends will resume. Figure 1 depicts the percentage reduction in global poverty during the period 1990 to 2015 (does not reflect the COVID-19 pandemic impact).

2.4. How Poverty Destroys Societal Potential

Despite a few bright spots, Sub-Saharan Africa remains mired in poverty. In the beginning of the 21st century, the United Nations put in place ambitious goals for this region since “The region had one of the highest percentages of people living in extreme poverty, the highest number of deaths among children under 5 and among mothers, and the lowest primary school enrollment rate.” However, progress has been modest in this region, which is home to roughly one billion people, about 15% of the world’s population. Figure 2 illustrates the decrease in child mortality for the period 1990 to 2015.

2.5. Examples of Economic Growth

In a Brookings report (2 February 2022), The Evolution of Global Poverty, 1990–2030, authors Kharas and Dooley (2022) wrote the following: “The last 30 years have seen dramatic reductions in global poverty, spurred by strong catch-up growth in developing countries, especially in Asia. By 2015, some 729 million people, 10% of the population, lived under the $1.90-a-day poverty line, greatly exceeding the Millennium Development Goal target of halving poverty. From 2012 to 2013, at the peak of global poverty reduction, the global poverty headcount fell by 130 million poor people.” Among the champions in the global race for poverty alleviation (or reduction) are populous nations such as China, Moldova, Vietnam, Indonesia, Tajikistan, India, and Bangladesh. Together these nations have succeeded in eliminating poverty for a vast number of their citizens, ushering them into the lower-middle class, who now have access to education and a much greater potential for both family income and wealth. (Asai et al., 2023).

New technologies have played a decisive role in this process. For example, in Bangladesh, mobile or cell phone technology has spread rapidly, and their use is now ubiquitous. “Mobile telecommunication is one of the fastest growing industries in Bangladesh and mobile phones have had a transformative impact on the economic and social life of the country” (https://medialandscapes.org/country/bangladesh/telecommunications/overview#:~:text=The%20telecom%20sector%20is%20also,price%20and%20early%20disaster%20warning, accessed on 5 October 2025).

2.6. An Outdated, Dysfunctional, and Unjust Global Financial Architecture

During June 2023, United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres said that “Developing countries are buckling under high debt and exorbitant borrowing costs, that prevent them from reviving their economies… [and] many African States were spending more on debt repayments than on desperately needed healthcare, and that over 50 countries were either in default or ‘dangerously’ close to it.” Mr. Guterres “called for a debt relief mechanism that supports payment suspensions, longer lending terms and lower rates to make borrowing more affordable for poorer nations, as well as increased access to liquidity for developing countries via the International Monetary Fund’s Special Drawing Rights.”

Secretary-General Guterres warned that “Doing nothing is simply not an option and at the halfway point to reaching the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) they are “drifting further away by the day,” warning that a New Global Financing Pact is necessary, and that “it was clear the international financial architecture built in the aftermath of World War Two ‘has failed in its mission to provide a global safety net for developing countries.’” (Guterres, 2023).

3. Climate Change and Global Warming

The impact of daily negative climate developments now threatens humanity. Shao and Zhong (2023) report that “Temperatures around the world… have been at their highest levels in decades for this time of year.” In addition, “The spike reflects two factors that are shaping what forecasters say could be a multiyear period of exceptional warmth for the planet: humans’ continued emissions of heat-trapping gases and the return, after three years, of the natural climate pattern known as El Niño.”

The Water Issue

Of concern, Erdenesanaa (2023) warns that May 2023 ocean temperatures are the hottest on record [in many places], and “For the planet as a whole May was the third warmest on record… Warmer water tends to hold less oxygen, and large-scale fish die-offs may happen earlier in the year as the climate continues to warm… higher temperatures contribute to coral reefs dying.” Because the ocean expands as it warms, sea levels rise due to melting ice sheets.

By mid-2023, The New York Times reports that for Bangladesh, “its most profound threat is water, in its many terrible incarnations: drought, deluge, cyclones, saltwater. All are aggravated to varying degrees by climate change, and all are forcing millions of people to do whatever they can to keep their heads above it.” (Sengupta, 2023). While the use of technology for flash flood disaster warning may seem primitive compared to highly sophisticated systems elsewhere, the use of phone calls and texts to villages is an important improvement that was not possible just a few decades earlier. On a related issue, Zhong (2023) reports that “For decades, scientists had been watching the average position of our planet’s rotational axis, the imaginary rod around which it turns, gently wander south, away from the geographic North Pole and toward Canada. Suddenly though, it made a sharp turn and started heading east.” It was puzzling at first; in time, researchers came to a startling realization about what had happened. The accelerated melting of the polar ice sheets and mountain glaciers had changed the way mass was distributed around the planet, enough to influence its spin.

Now, some of the same scientists have identified another factor that had the same kind of effect: colossal quantities of water pumped out of the ground for crops and households…Water experts have long warned of the consequences of groundwater overuse, particularly as water from underground aquifers becomes an increasingly vital resource in drought-stressed areas and even in locales often characterized as water rich. Guelph is one of a few cities in Canada that relies solely on groundwater for drinking water. It is expected that the city will face a water deficit in the near future (Hania, 2015). Besides limited drinking water, another concern for water-stressed regions is that when water is pumped out but not replenished, the land can sink, damaging homes and infrastructure and also shrinking the amount of underground space that can hold water thereafter. (Zhong, 2023).

In another disturbing example, by the time South Korea’s 2023 monsoon season had started with a fatality, President Yoon Suk Yeol had already said in an emergency meeting, “We can no longer call such abnormal weather abnormal.” (Young, 2023).

The impact of global warming on rising sea levels would have major welfare-reducing implications for many countries around the world, including several coastal nations in the developing world (Pycroft et al., 2016).

4. Food Insecurity

4.1. Food Insecurity Defined and Measured

The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA, 2022) defines food security as easy access by individuals and families to enough food for an active, healthy life. Accordingly, the agency also defines “food insecurity” in terms of the severity of its prevalence.

• Low food security (old label = food insecurity without hunger): reports of reduced quality, variety, or desirability of diet. Little or no indication of reduced food intake.
• Very low food security (old label = food insecurity with hunger): reports of multiple indications of disrupted eating patterns and reduced food intake.

In a report titled, “Hunger and Food Insecurity,” (FAO, 2023) the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) uses the following definition of food insecurity:

A person is food insecure when they lack regular access to enough safe and nutritious food for normal growth and development and an active and healthy life. This may be due to unavailability of food and/or lack of resources to obtain food. Food insecurity can be experienced at different levels of severity. The USDA definition is precise, empirically strong, but limited to domestic U.S. conditions. The FAO definition is broader, internationally standardized, and policy-oriented, making it more appropriate for analyzing global food insecurity, especially in the context of developing nations, international economic systems, and global crises such as the pandemic or the war in Ukraine.

The International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI, n.d.) based in Rome states the following:

Food security, as defined by the United Nations’ Committee on World Food Security, means that all people, at all times, have physical, social, and economic access to sufficient, safe, and nutritious food that meets their food preferences and dietary needs for an active and healthy life. Over the coming decades, a changing climate, growing global population, rising food prices, and environmental stressors will have significant yet uncertain impacts on food security. Adaptation strategies and policy responses to global change, including options for handling water allocation, land use patterns, food trade, postharvest food processing, and food prices and safety, are urgently needed.

4.2. Recent Trends

The UN FAO uses several indicators to measure food insecurity, including a) the Prevalence of Undernourishment (POU) and b) the Prevalence of moderate or severe food insecurity in the population, based on the Food Insecurity Experience Scale (FIES). These measures are used to measure global progress toward achieving the UN’s Sustainable Development Goal 2 (SDG2) which aligns with the vision to achieve a world free of hunger (zero hunger) by 2030 (UN Sustainable Development Goals, 2022). According to this United Nations report:

In 2020, between 720 million and 811 million people worldwide were suffering from hunger, roughly 161 million more than in 2019. Also in 2020, a staggering 2.4 billion people, or above 30 percent of the world’s population, were moderately or severely food insecure, lacking regular access to adequate food. The figure increased by nearly 320 million people in just one year. Globally, 149.2 million children under 5 years of age, or 22.0 percent, were suffering from stunting (low height for their age) in 2020, a decrease from 24.4 percent in 2015. These trends are grim, tragic, and ominous…

The number of people going hungry and suffering from food insecurity has been gradually rising between 2014 and the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. The COVID-19 crisis has pushed those rising rates even higher and has also exacerbated all forms of malnutrition, particularly in children. The war in Ukraine is further disrupting global food supply chains and creating the biggest global food crisis since the Second World War.

A World Bank (2023a) report further underlines the reversal in progress, and worsening of these dangerous trends towards food insecurity and hunger, made worse by recent geopolitical conflicts and climate change:

It is estimated that hunger levels have risen sharply around the world. According to the latest World Bank analysis of FAO data and a model that leverages the IMF World Economic Outlook, projections for the future outlook of global hunger suggest that hunger will persist. Additional devastating effects from extreme weather events and conflict are likely to drive many countries into crisis. This year, as many as 1 billion people—one in eight—globally have had severe difficulty obtaining food and have had to skip meals as a result. After a decade of consistent development gains, global hunger has increased sharply in recent years. The number of severely food-insecure individuals will likely have increased by more than 220 million between 2019 and the end of 2023, primarily fueled by conflict, climate change, and economic shocks worsened by the COVID-19 pandemic.

4.3. Impact of the Pandemic and Ukraine War

Not surprisingly, in the developing world, food insecurity is usually closely linked with poverty, lack of employment, low incomes, a lack of affordable housing, chronic health conditions, and disruptions caused by natural (draught) or man-made disasters (corruption, civil wars). For example, according to UNHCR (2023), in the Horn of Africa, which is among the poorest regions in the developing world, an estimated 57 million people live in extreme poverty and suffer from hunger, much of which can be traced to the supply chain disruptions caused by the global COVID-19 pandemic, long-term trends in climate change, protracted wars and conflicts, and the unexpected war in Ukraine, which has not just impacted and disrupted global supplies of grain and energy but has also redirected resources (foreign aid) which otherwise would have contributed to reducing food insecurity around the world. According to the World Bank (2023b):

The COVID-19 pandemic prompted social distancing, workplace closures, and restrictions on mobility and trade that had cascading effects on economic activity, food prices, and employment in low- and middle-income countries. Using longitudinal data from Bangladesh, Kenya, and Nigeria covering a period from October 2020 to April 2021, the paper finds that the likelihood of households experiencing food insecurity at the extensive and intensive margins increased among those who knew an infected person in Bangladesh and Kenya.

4.4. Proposed Solutions and Creative Ideas

Economists have linked food insecurity to several factors including low wages, adverse social and economic conditions, high prices of essential food such as rice, and dramatic changes in entitlements—where the real price of food that someone would pay in exchange for their labor (or what they have to sell) is beyond what most people can afford. In extreme circumstances, this leads to famine, where a large number of people suffer from prolonged hunger. According to Noble prize-winning economist, Amartya Sen (Basu, n.d.), unlike the conventional view, famine is often caused not by a natural disaster that leads to a large reduction in food supplies but rather by the inability of many households to access the food available in the market. Sen describes this phenomenon as an “entitlement failure,” where a family’s ability to access food drastically declines to a level where the family starves to death unless there is a massive relief effort to provide free food. The immediate solution prescribed is to undertake massive relief, using free food (gruel kitchens), and also increasing the demand (food entitlements) by distributing cash to enable the markets to resume normal operations.

5. The Promise of Technology

Time is the exact currency that technology needs, for it morphs daily, changing and adapting to accommodate humans’ needs and progressive development.

5.1. Internet of Things (IoT)

With the advent of the Internet, several African countries have developed advanced payment systems.We have become accustomed to the adherence to what is known as the Internet of Things (IoT). The vision of IoT enhances connectivity to the internet through daily objects possessed by humans such as cell phones, computers, tablets, etc. This paradigm of connectivity is shifting us rapidly towards IoT where most of our daily objects are connected somehow to the internet to collect data, find patterns, help with task execution, and ease of living (Coetzee & Eksteen, 2011). This is surely becoming the norm of everyday living. Of profound importance, IoT sensory devices are assisting in agriculture, electrical, and water utility efficiency in lesser developed economies.

5.2. Artificial Intelligence (AI)

It was the dramatic rise in computer chip processing speed and reduced cost of data storage that set the stage for the recent worldwide focus on artificial intelligence (AI) and applications such as ChatGPT-5. Trautman et al. (2024b) wrote that “machine learning and AI have been influencing our culture for several years now.” Prominent examples include the consideration of user-indicated preferences revealed in applications such as Facebook, Google, and Instagram. As a consumer searches for specific product information, like EV cars for example, the programs will “learn” from these inquiries and return future relevant information to the user. Other examples include verbal questions asked of Amazon’s Alexa, Apple’s Siri, or Google’s voice assistant applications. The self-driving function pioneered by and available now on Tesla automobiles is another useful example of “machine learning” from a very large data set. The promise of AI’s beneficial impact is significant.

Using the IoT model, artificial intelligence (AI) or what the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence describes as “the scientific understanding of the mechanisms underlying thought and intelligent behavior and their embodiment in machines” (Castro & New, 2016) has successfully intersected with many aspects of human living. Its wide array of functions allows it to be utilized in different sectors allowing accurate and fast results, new outcomes, and better service (AI Overview, 2016). For instance, the medical sector is seeking assistance from the Deep Learning (DL) form of AI, which uses artificial neural networks to process input, that works with extreme accuracy to detect certain features providing an accurate outcome after passing it via many layers of interconnected nodes. Further, AI’s efficiency in processing ingested data and finding patterns regarding one’s health has, in turn, helped take over the little repetitive tasks that require minimal cognitive work as well as free up healthcare workers’ time to focus on more complex tasks including fostering more patient connections (Aung et al., 2021). AI’s ability to gather substantial data, analyze it, and figure out patterns in the patient’s medical history is extremely helpful for surgeons through its way of capturing data across the phases of care and providing deeper scientific context, which has revolutionized a new perspective to approach surgery (Hashimoto et al., 2018).

5.3. Genetics and Health

The subsets of AI that include machine learning (ML) and DL are helping healthcare sectors with groundbreaking findings such as the help of “Deep Genomics in identifying the linkages to diseases in large data sets of genetic information and medical records” (Lin, 2019). Additionally, groundbreaking endeavors in the health sector are vastly affecting the area of Pharmaceuticals. According to Atomwise, they were able to develop two drugs using AI that are predicted to reduce Ebola’s infectivity. This is historical in the sense that this very finding was the result of AI research that occurred in less than a day saving the company time and billions of dollars in the process (Meskó et al., 2018). AI’s extensive bandwidth to execute tasks with accuracy stretches its potential to assist other fields, leading them to efficiency and satisfactory outcomes as shown in the fields of law and finance. According to the Fordham Law Review, some of the human endeavors in the finance world have been vastly eliminated and substituted by artificial intelligence. This has been a result of artificial intelligence’s capability to lower the cost of capital for businesses, expand financial resources, and enhance profit, which is the optimum goal of any successful business model (Lin, 2019). The artificial intelligence revolution is leaving its mark on all domains and is proliferating rapidly to accustom to the daily needs of this decade. Closely related, the prospect for many new jobs arise from the manufacture of new technology such as the recently announced $4.6 Billion semiconductor chip plant in Poland and following Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s June 2023 visit to the United States, Google, Amazon, and Microsoft announce major technology investments in India (HT Tech, 2023).

David Wallace-Wells (2023) writes in the New York Times Magazine (that “The miracle of the vaccines wasn’t just about lives saved from Covid… [but include] future mRNA applications: H.I.V., tuberculosis, Zika, respiratory syncytial virus (R.S.V.), cancers of various and brutal kinds,” just to name a few. Of significant importance, “vaccine innovations stretch beyond mRNA: A ‘world-changing’ vaccine for malaria, which kills 600,000 globally each year, is being rolled out in Ghana and Nigeria, and early trials for next-generation dengue vaccines suggest they may reduce symptomatic infection by 80 percent or more… New trials of breast-cancer drugs have led to survival rates hailed in The Times as ‘unheard-of,’ and new treatment for postoperative lung-cancer patients may cut mortality by more than half.”

6. Technological Challenges

Global laws, government policy, and economic systems are always challenged by rapid technological change. Having looked at some of the exciting benefits provided by technological advances, let us now explore a few of the societal challenges brought about by rapid technological change. Although volumes have been and will be written about these important topics, space limitations will result in our ability to provide more than a brief overview.

6.1. Artificial Intelligence (AI)

The year 2023 starts with a global frenzy caused by the impact of ChatGPT. Trautman et al. (2024a) warn that “On 22 March 2023, an open letter signed by recognizable technology industry names such as Elon Musk; Steve Wozniak; and former presidential candidate Andrew Yang receives widespread press attention. Early signatories also included professors: Yoshua Bengio (U Montreal); Stuart Russell (Berkeley); Yuval Noah Harari (Hebrew U of Jerusalem); John J. Hopfield (Princeton); Max Tegmark (MIT); Anthony Aguirre (U California, Santa Cruz); Danielle Allen (Harvard); Gary Marcus (NYU); and Vincent Conitzer (Carnegie Mellon and Oxford), just to name a few.” We have reproduced the warning as follows:

AI systems with human-competitive intelligence can pose profound risks to society and humanity, as shown by extensive research and acknowledged by top AI labs. As stated in the widely endorsed Asilomar AI Principles, advanced AI could represent a profound change in the history of life on Earth and should be planned for and managed with commensurate care and resources. Unfortunately, this level of planning and management is not happening, even though recent months have seen AI labs locked in an out-of-control race to develop and deploy ever more powerful digital minds that no one—not even their creators—can understand, predict, or reliably control.

Contemporary AI systems are now becoming human-competitive at general tasks, and we must ask ourselves: Should we let machines flood our information channels with propaganda and untruth? Should we automate away all the jobs, including the fulfilling ones? Should we develop nonhuman minds that might eventually outnumber, outsmart, obsolete, and replace us? Should we risk the loss of control of our civilization? Such decisions must not be delegated to unelected tech leaders. Powerful AI systems should be developed only once we are confident that their effects will be positive, and their risks will be manageable. This confidence must be well justified and increase with the magnitude of a system’s potential effects. OpenAI’s recent statement regarding artificial general intelligence states that “At some point, it may be important to get independent review before starting to train future systems, and for the most advanced efforts to agree to limit the rate of growth of compute used for creating new models.” We agree. That point is now.

Therefore, we call on all AI labs to immediately pause for at least 6 months the training of AI systems more powerful than GPT-4. This pause should be public and verifiable and include all key actors. If such a pause cannot be enacted quickly, governments should step in and institute a moratorium.

AI labs and independent experts should use this pause to jointly develop and implement a set of shared safety protocols for advanced AI design and development that are rigorously audited and overseen by independent outside experts. These protocols should ensure that systems adhering to them are safe beyond a reasonable doubt. This does not mean a pause on AI development in general but merely a stepping back from the dangerous race to ever-larger unpredictable black-box models with emergent capabilities.

AI research and development should be refocused on making today’s powerful, state-of-the-art systems more accurate, safe, interpretable, transparent, robust, aligned, trustworthy, and loyal.

In parallel, AI developers must work with policymakers to dramatically accelerate the development of robust AI governance systems. These should at a minimum include new and capable regulatory authorities dedicated to AI; oversight and tracking of highly capable AI systems and large pools of computational capability; provenance and watermarking systems to help distinguish real from synthetic and to track model leaks; a robust auditing and certification ecosystem; liability for AI-caused harm; robust public funding for technical AI safety research; and well-resourced institutions for coping with the dramatic economic and political disruptions (especially to democracy) that AI will cause.

Humanity can enjoy a flourishing future with AI. Having succeeded in creating powerful AI systems, we can now enjoy an “AI summer” in which we reap the rewards, engineer these systems for the clear benefit of all, and give society a chance to adapt. Society has hit pause on other technologies with potentially catastrophic effects on society. We can do so here. Let us enjoy a long AI summer, not rush unprepared into a fall (internal citations omitted).

Technologist Eric Schmidt (2023) states just a few weeks after the publication of the “open letter warning” during a television interview that “It’s not a good idea to take a time-out and let your competitors win.”

6.2. Cybersecurity

Threats and breaches in cybersecurity remain a plague on governments, business entities, and individuals everywhere. Now only several decades into the widespread adoption of Internet use, ransomware attacks (Trautman et al., 2022) and data theft continues to grow as a major threat, causing billions of dollars in annual losses. Nation-states are also responsible for addressing the increased threats and attacks to all of the institutions mentioned above.

7. Multinational Criminal Organizations vs. Humanity

Trautman and Altenbaumer-Price have previously written that “In any of its various forms, bribery, extortion, or corruption exacts an unacceptable toll on all citizens of the world.” They further conclude that “Thinking about the difficult issues surrounding corruption produced a realization that the global and domestic culture of bribery, extortion, and corruption is an amorphous cancer eating away at our societies with the very real potential to destroy commerce between nations and produce destructive global civil unrest.” Often, this pervasive problem presents itself simply as when a warlord steals shipments of food or medicines destined for starving or illness-stricken populations.

7.1. Corruption Is Rampant

Transparency International’s (2023) Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) discloses “that most of the world continues to fail to fight corruption: 95 percent of countries have made little to no progress since 2017. According to the Global Peace Index, the world continues to become a less peaceful place. There is a clear connection between this violence and corruption, with countries that score lowest in this index also scoring very low on the CPI. Governments hampered by corruption cannot protect the people, while public discontent is more likely to turn into violence. This vicious cycle is impacting countries everywhere…Corruption has made our world a more dangerous place.” Consider the following:

The CPI ranks 180 countries and territories by their perceived levels of public sector corruption on a scale of zero (highly corrupt) to 100 (very clean). For 2022, the CPI global average remains unchanged at 43 for the eleventh year in a row, and more than two-thirds of countries have a serious problem with corruption, scoring below 50.

Denmark (90) tops the index this year, with Finland and New Zealand following closely, both at 87. Strong democratic institutions and regard for human rights also make these countries some of the most peaceful in the world according to the Global Peace Index.

South Sudan (13), Syria (13), and Somalia (12), all of which are embroiled in protracted conflict, remain at the bottom of the CPI.

A total of 26 countries—among them are the United Kingdom (73), Qatar (58), and Guatemala (24)—are all at historic lows this year.

7.2. Terrorism

Trautman and Michaely (2014) has observed that while “technological advances create great opportunities to improve the health, living conditions, and general wellbeing of mankind; new technologies also create great challenges for nation states.” Financing terrorism activities is enhanced by the pervasive illicit drug trade and useful technological advances.

For example, virtual currencies present particularly difficult law enforcement challenges because of their ability to transcend national borders in a fraction of a second; unique jurisdictional issues; and anonymity due to encryption. Due to primarily their anonymous characteristic, virtual currencies have been linked to numerous types of crimes, including facilitating marketplaces for assassins; attacks on businesses; child exploitation (including pornography); corporate espionage; counterfeit currencies; drugs; fake IDs and passports; high yield investment schemes (Ponzi schemes and other financial frauds); sexual exploitation; stolen credit cards and credit card numbers; and weapons. Innovation in the pace of development of new currencies and technologies continues to create ongoing challenges for responsible users of technology and regulators alike.

Cybercriminals are especially attracted to the use of cryptocurrencies because these allow stealth and anonymity, which crime syndicates crave.

8. Role of the United Nations

The United Nations (UN) agenda to make the world a better place for its inhabitants branches out to include many initiatives that all assist with its main cause of bettering the conditions of life for all of humanity, especially those in developing countries. Its efforts range from mitigating globalization and equipping developing countries with the right tools to cope with ever-changing dynamics to the ongoing efforts of eradicating poverty and increasing the quality of life among citizens of developing countries (Ruggie, 2003).

The United Nations’ efforts to eradicate poverty were established in 1995. Accordingly, the poverty eradication process gets updated every decade to lower poverty and reach the optimum goal of a world with no poverty. According to the United Nations’ Synthesis Report of Peace and Development Trust Fund (2016–2021), the United Nations put forth certain goals to help with the poverty eradication efforts including catalyzing sustainable growth and structural transformation, involving initiatives such as enabling small businesses, leaving no one behind, and empowering the least developed and vulnerable countries. Since 2015, poverty has increased drastically as the world progressed toward multiple geopolitical, socioeconomic, and climatic risks. In the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, the United Nations called for 17 goals targeted towards eradicating poverty and assisting the wellbeing of developing countries in the World. For instance, the United Nations emphasized the ending of world hunger in its agenda, promoting gender equality, women empowerment, the availability and sustainability of water supplies, accessibility and affordability of energy, inclusive economic growth efforts, building resilient infrastructure, and reducing inequality among countries, among other imperative goals that contribute to the survival and growth of developing countries. Among the plethora of efforts that the United Nations has put forth to revive developing countries from the economic crisis, was an effort to strengthen the capacity to establish a sustainable agriculture system. Historically, the rural areas in developing countries were left behind from the undernourishment reduction efforts, hence, the involvement of Juncao technology that allows farmers to mass produce a type of mushroom, minimize soil erosion, produce cattle food as well generate methane gas and renewable energy according to the United Nations Synthesis Report (United Nations, 2022).

Further, the United Nations is helping developing countries and impoverished communities through the development of Universal Social Protection. Its goal is to increase social justice and reduce poverty and vulnerability in developing countries through supporting inclusivity and sustainable growth as well as raising household incomes. It also released its initiative encouraging multilateralism which calls for a more global approach where relevant stakeholders are engaged and are keeping pace to adapt rapidly to the changing realities. According to the UN Synthesis report, a total of 195 personnel working in the peacemaking initiatives directed by the UN have been killed by acts of violence. Therefore, more than 10 projects have been launched and funded by the UNPDF to improve the safety of peacemakers in the developing areas (United Nations, 2022).

9. Discussion and Conclusions

Rapid technological advances offer promise and have successfully been deployed to the advantage of impoverished countries. However, resource-poor nations are at a disadvantage when it comes to development and the rapid adoption of new technologies since their R&D budgets are low. Newer technologies are being developed in the developed world for those who live in relatively rich nations. However, there are important exceptions to this as in the spread of mobile or cell phones which have penetrated the least developed and remote parts of the world, with great benefits allowing poor nations to leapfrog older technologies. This has been especially true in mobile banking or money transfer, education, disaster relief, governance, and healthcare. We believe that this paper contributes to a better understanding of how these technological gains may have a positive impact on impoverished nations. Looking ahead, future research should take a closer and more systematic look at how the transfer of modern technologies shapes both economic progress and financial stability in developing nations. One promising path is to use well-established economic and financial models to measure how technology adoption affects productivity, income distribution, and access to financial resources. Applying these models to specific countries such as nations in Sub-Saharan Africa or South Asia would help identify why some developing economies benefit more quickly from technological change, while others continue to struggle with structural inequalities and limited credit access.

At the same time, future research should not overlook the risks that accompany rapid technological transformation. While digital tools, financial technologies, and automation can make markets more efficient and connected, they can also create new vulnerabilities, such as cybersecurity threats, financial instability, and disruptions in labor markets or global supply chains.

Another important area for future work is understanding the institutional and policy frameworks that help countries absorb new technologies effectively. Comparative research could explore how good governance, sound regulatory systems, and inclusive financial policies support the successful diffusion of technology.

Policymakers and NGOs must also take seriously proven strategies for poverty reduction such as microcredit and microfinance, which have made a substantial dent to extreme poverty in Bangladesh largely due to the efforts of the Grameen Bank, BRAC, and a host of small microcredit NGOs. The work of these organizations has demonstrated that the poor are eminently bankable, and if traditional banks are not reaching out to these populations, it is their shortcoming. Social entrepreneurs can and should expand existing programs and build new programs to reach out to the poor to integrate them into modern banking and economy. Even though many of them are without assets, they are dependable borrowers and creative small business owners. The organizations built to serve them require some discipline since they are unable to provide collateral; but from decades of work with millions of poor borrowers, it is now proven beyond any doubt that a huge part of humanity has been kept out of modern banking and economy by false ideas and assumptions on which we have built many of our institutions. Technology transfer and its creative use have played a significant role in Grameen Bank’s efforts to serve the poor. We provide two examples of award-winning programs. The Grameen Shakti, an NGO created to bring renewable energy to the poor, has installed millions of solar panels for the rural poor in Bangladesh providing them with electricity where electric lines do not exist or supplement electricity from traditional sources. Once again this “social business” is profitable, but all of its surplus is plowed back to expanding the services. Before cell phones became a household item even for the rural poor, the “Grameen Phone Ladies” provided services in remote villages of Bangladesh, to family members of migrant or guest workers who have gone to the Middle East to work and send back their earnings to their families.

Finally, there is a growing need to explore how emerging digital, artificial intelligence, and green finance innovations can contribute to reshaping the global financial architecture in more equitable and sustainable ways. Research in this area could examine how technology can expand financial inclusion, support climate-resilient investment, and promote fairer access to credit for low-income countries.