The United Arab Emirates has emphasized the significance of partnerships and technological advancements in transforming food systems and enhancing capabilities to address the challenges posed by climate change.
During her participation in COP29 in Baku, Mariam bint Mohammed Almheiri, head of the international affairs office in the UAE Presidential Court, stated that utilizing a new generation of digital tools, supported by generative artificial intelligence technology such as large language models, can improve services for extension workers and farmers.
Almheiri joined several events at the 29th Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP29) to highlight the progress made in implementing partnerships over the past year.
She began her engagement program at COP29 with a dialogue session in the UAE pavilion, organized in collaboration with the Board of Directors of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The session, titled “Partnering to Create AI-based Public Goods for 500 Million Smallholders,” focused on increasing access to agricultural extension services, which is crucial for improving the lives of millions of smallholder families worldwide.
The discussion explored the potential of generative AI as an effective tool for enhancing the delivery of agricultural research and extension services in climate-vulnerable countries, thereby expanding access for these farmers.
During COP28, hosted by the UAE last year, the partnership between the UAE and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation on agricultural innovation was announced.
Almheiri remarked, “With the new pilot AgriLLM project we have launched with our global partners at COP29 we will leverage UAE’s open-access suite of Falcon LLMs to make accurate, trustworthy, and transparent information available to farmers from around the world." She added, “As a first step, the AgriLLM will aim to act as a decision-support tool for agricultural researchers, development professionals, and extension agents.”
Martin van Nieuwkoop, Director of Agricultural Development at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, noted that the UAE and the Foundation launched a new partnership during COP28 to invest in agricultural innovation. This collaboration aims to address the urgent needs of small farmers in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia by providing them with better tools and resources to tackle the growing threats posed by climate change.
Almheiri also participated in a side dialogue session at the opening of COP29, moderated by Professor Amir Jena, Chair of the Technical Committee for the “Agricultural Innovation Mechanism for Scale” initiative, known as “AIM for Scale.”
She highlighted the significant benefits of empowering hundreds of millions of farmers by providing them with essential climate information, such as weather forecasts, to secure their futures.
Regarding the initiative’s goals, she emphasized that innovation is essential for climate action and is central to this initiative. The UAE firmly believes, she said, in strengthening the global system that supports the development and deployment of pioneering technologies to accelerate transformation, achieve net-zero emissions in the future, and redesign food systems. She underscored the UAE’s commitment to the weather innovation package within the initiative by launching a new training and research program in AI-based weather forecast.
To this end, the UAE will launch a new training and research program in weather forecasting based on artificial intelligence. Almheiri stressed that this program, led by the Mohamed bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence, will collaborate with several technical partners worldwide, including the World Meteorological Organization, the University of Chicago, and the National Center of Meteorology in the UAE. The aim is to develop new technologies for utilizing artificial intelligence in weather forecasts while providing technical training opportunities and support to over 30 partner countries over three years.
