Artificial intelligence could help offset Asia’s shrinking workforce as populations age if adoption is scaled evenly across the region, the International Monetary Fund said on Monday.
IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva said at a book launch during meetings at the Queen Sirikit National Convention Center that AI is projected to lift growth in advanced Asia by 0.5 to 1 percentage point, more than offsetting demographic pressure if productivity is captured.
Countries including China, Japan and South Korea could lose nearly 25 percent of their working population between now and 2050, according to findings in the IMF book, though productivity gains from AI could offset that loss.
IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva presented the findings during the IMF and World Bank annual meetings at the Queen Sirikit National Convention Center. She identified demographics, regional trade integration and artificial intelligence as the three central shifts deciding Asia’s economic trajectory.
AI is projected to lift up growth in advanced Asia, where the ageing populations are, somewhere between half a percentage and one percentage point… And what is amazing is that if the countries capture productivity and this growth, they will more than offset the demographic pressure
The gap between mature industrial economies and developing Southeast Asian nations creates an uneven playing field for artificial intelligence rollout. Wealthier hubs possess the computing infrastructure and capital required to automate white-collar tasks and industrial workflows quickly.
Developing markets face different exposure levels. Krishna Srinivasan, director of the IMF Asia and Pacific department, warned that emerging economies have fewer automated jobs today but also lack the capital to capture software-driven productivity gains without targeted policy support.
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