Southeast Asia, as a developing region, has seen some of the most interesting use cases for AI and robotics. However, the ASEAN workforce is struggling to keep up with the rapid evolution of technology and the growing demands of industries.

ASEAN industry leaders and policymakers believe there is already a solution at hand — yet implementing it is an entirely different matter.

Citing a recent study, Attorney Jocelle Batapa-Sigue, Undersecretary for ICT Industry Development at the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) in the Philippines, highlighted the industries with the fastest-growing AI adoption in the country. Topping the list are professional services, followed by tech, media, and information sectors. Next come financial services and manufacturing, with education lagging at the bottom.

“We need to bring education up to the requirements of our industry, otherwise we will really run out of talent,” she said during a panel on “The future of work: The role of AI and robotics in shaping ASEAN’s workforce,” part of the 8th ASEAN CIO Forum held in Manila.

Regional challenges

One of the many apprehensions about AI is that the technology will make many human jobs obsolete. However, according to Lim Chinn Hwa, Co-founder and CEO of AI and robotics firm dConstruct Technologies, their goal is not to replace people but to empower them.

“There are a lot of jobs out there that very few people want, such as high-risk, dangerous ones. In the ASEAN region, we found that there is a 15% shortage of manpower in the construction space. Therefore, we build solutions for surveillance, to inspect those dirty, dangerous places, and figure out how we can upgrade the existing workforce to be able to handle that equipment,” he said.

On the enterprise side, the costs of running AI workloads are expected to rise unless organisations become smarter with their deployment strategies.

“We all know that AI is sexy, but the cost of energy to run AI is predicted to be 10 times what it is at the moment. The cost is quite high, so it’s important to be deliberate when implementing AI. For example, you need to learn the proper use cases for it, how it will benefit your organisation, and how it will affect not only your workforce but also citizens,” said Jonathan C. Pineda, OIC Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer, Government Service Insurance System (GSIS), Philippines.

Despite ASEAN being an agricultural hub, the farming industry is in peril because farmers are ageing, noted Mylene Abiva, President and CEO of robotics firm FELTA Multi-Media Inc.

To help address this challenge, the company partnered with academia to foster deeper research and collaboration.

“Our company has just set up an AI and robotics laboratory at the Southeast Asia Regional Center for Agricultural Research at the University of the Philippines Los Baños, to make agriculture attractive again for ASEAN. I believe ASEAN can support our government and businesses by using smart agriculture,” she said.

Industry interventions

The DICT has launched the Philippine Skills Framework, modelled after Singapore’s approach, in collaboration with the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) to introduce the framework across universities and regions nationwide.

Additionally, the DICT has announced AI certifications and skills training, most of which will be free of charge.

“It’s not our own curriculum but actually the employers’ certifications, so there’s a big possibility of them hiring successful candidates after the courses,” Batapa-Sigue said.

She elaborated on the agency’s approach: “We use a multi-pronged strategy — horizontal and vertical. We need to understand that the Philippines is made up not just of Metro Manila but more than 18 regions, and many of the gems in AI and other emerging technologies are universities located several hundred kilometres from where we are today. What we do is identify AI champions in universities across these regions and have our regional directors work with them. We host regional ICT summits, exhibitions, and digital careers expos. A young child from the countryside learns that there’s a career in digital, and suddenly, they don’t need to leave the Philippines. They can work here, or, if they do go abroad, they can secure a high-paying job.”

However, the ICT Undersecretary admitted that more work is needed to strengthen AI engineering skills in the country.

“We love AI, and we’re interested in AI, but we need to translate AI into a reason for us to secure jobs in the market,” she remarked.

GSIS’ Pineda agreed: “AI has been around for a long time, but the use cases were quite limited until what happened two years ago with generative AI. It’s great that we have pending laws on AI, but we’re still a bit behind compared to countries like Singapore and Malaysia, who have gone all in.”

In Singapore, the government has invested heavily in AI development and adoption, and companies like dConstruct Technologies are ensuring the enterprise sector plays its part in improving the country’s workforce.

“We work very closely with academia in Singapore and bring in the workforce perspective — how AI and robotics are used in business. From that perspective, we quickly collaborate with academia to figure out what kinds of engineers we need to develop,” Lim Chinn Hwa said.

Fostering collaboration

One proactive approach to developing a more skilled workforce is by training children at a young age — specifically in coding.

FELTA, for example, teaches coding to kids as early as four years old.

“We foresee that coding is going to be like writing for our youth, and that’s how we start AI — by fostering critical thinkers at a very young age. In the Philippines, we are still at the stage where coding is a fundamental skill that needs to be taught to the youth. If you jump straight to AI, it will be difficult,” Abiva observed.

To support this, FELTA partnered with the Philippine Space Agency to immerse children in space data.

“The Philippine Space Agency can help recruit our robotics students, so they can become researchers as well. With space data, they can project environmental degradation from space and gather other information or data we can use,” she added.

In addition to modernising education, the DICT is also working to elevate government offices to regional standards, one automated workflow at a time.

“While we advocate for upskilling our citizens, we must first upskill public sector workers,” Batapa-Sigue emphasised.

One of the agencies ramping up AI adoption is the GSIS.

“The first thing we focus on is transparency, ensuring the GSIS board is aware of the risks, and that the workforce understands how this will impact them. There are many opportunities for AI in the financial services industry, particularly in fraud detection and empowering the workforce,” Pineda concluded.