{"id":118463,"date":"2020-09-24T16:39:01","date_gmt":"2020-09-24T16:39:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.microsoft.com\/?p=439220"},"modified":"2020-09-24T16:39:01","modified_gmt":"2020-09-24T16:39:01","slug":"ai-for-humanitarian-action-expands-program-beyond-nonprofits","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/2020\/09\/24\/ai-for-humanitarian-action-expands-program-beyond-nonprofits\/","title":{"rendered":"AI for Humanitarian Action expands program beyond nonprofits"},"content":{"rendered":"<div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/ai-for-humanitarian-action-expands-program-beyond-nonprofits.jpg\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\"><\/div>\n<p>Last December, before the onset of COVID-19, I had the opportunity to visit Zaatari in Jordan \u2013 the world\u2019s largest camp for Syrian refugees \u2013 to learn more about the challenges and opportunities refugees face. I met a young girl, Doha, who was participating in a computing class. I asked her what she thought about this class, and she said, \u201cComputing is the language of life today. It\u2019s how things get done.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>This week, while participating in the 75<sup>th<\/sup> United Nations General Assembly, I\u2019m reflecting on Doha and the inspiring leaders of the camp to see what more we can do to empower refugees and vulnerable communities, especially given the impact of the global pandemic. With the urgency of the moment, this week Microsoft Philanthropies will expand the reach of one of our programs to help underserved communities.<\/p>\n<p>Two years ago at the 73<sup>rd<\/sup> United Nations General Assembly, Microsoft President Brad Smith announced <a href=\"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/ai\/ai-for-humanitarian-action\">AI for Humanitarian Action<\/a> as part of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/ai\/ai-for-good\">Microsoft AI for Good<\/a>&nbsp;program, a $165 million initiative to help unlock the power of data and AI to address some of the biggest challenges facing society today. The five-year AI for Humanitarian Action commitment was launched to help change the way front-line relief organizations anticipate, predict and better target response efforts related to disaster recovery, the needs of children, promotion of human rights, and protection of refugees and displaced people.<\/p>\n<p>Over the past two years, we\u2019ve worked with selected nonprofit and humanitarian organizations to deliver on the program\u2019s promise to help respond to global humanitarian issues. Some examples include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Human rights <\/strong>\u2013 Empowering the <a href=\"https:\/\/cfj.org\/project\/trialwatch\/https:\/cfj.org\/project\/trialwatch\/\">Clooney Foundation for Justice<\/a> with innovative technology that supports monitoring and responding to trials around the world that pose a high risk of human rights violations.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Refugees and displaced people <\/strong>\u2013 Combating wrongful deportation of asylum seekers with the <a href=\"https:\/\/asylumadvocacy.org\/\">Asylum Seeker Advocacy Project<\/a> and&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/supportkind.org\/our-work\/family-separation-work\/\">KIND<\/a>.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Disaster response<\/strong><em> \u2013 <\/em>Improving the reach of open mapping of vulnerable areas with Bing and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hotosm.org\/projects\/ai-assisted-humanitarian-mapping\/\">the Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team (HOT)<\/a><\/li>\n<li><strong>Needs of children<\/strong><em> \u2013 <\/em>Enhancing surgical outcomes and helping more children in need of facial surgery through the use of a facial modeling algorithm with long-time nonprofit partner <a href=\"https:\/\/www.operationsmile.org\/\">Operation Smile<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Since 2018, the need to accelerate the pace of innovation has increased rapidly due to growing inequality and the COVID-19 pandemic. Building on the progress of the past two years and the urgency of the moment, we\u2019re expanding the program beyond nonprofits to include applications from any type of organization through October 31, 2020, with this <a href=\"http:\/\/aka.ms\/ai4humanitarian\">web portal.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The challenges faced by children are inextricably linked to those of women, including access to healthcare, which is disproportionally affecting women and children during COVID-19. As a result, we have also expanded the focus on children to include women.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>\u201cAn effective response to COVID-19 accounts for the disproportionate impact on vulnerable communities, including women and girls,\u201d said Michelle Nunn, President and CEO of CARE. \u201cIt is essential to listen to women and girls and ensure that all involved collect, publish and act on sex-disaggregated data to design inclusive and effective responses to COVID-19. That\u2019s why Microsoft\u2019s expansion of its AI for Humanitarian Action initiative to be inclusive of the needs of women and children is needed now more than ever.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>As we work with new partners through AI for Humanitarian Action to enable their work and accelerate their impact, we remain committed &nbsp;to using our expertise to help empower vulnerable populations \u2013 like those in Zaatari \u2013 by ensuring we leverage technology to address the broadest societal needs.<\/p>\n<p class=\"tag-list\">Tags: <a aria-label=\"See more stories about AI for Humanitarian Action\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.microsoft.com\/on-the-issues\/tag\/ai-for-humanitarian-action\/\" rel=\"tag\">AI for Humanitarian Action<\/a>, <a aria-label=\"See more stories about children\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.microsoft.com\/on-the-issues\/tag\/children\/\" rel=\"tag\">children<\/a>, <a aria-label=\"See more stories about COVID-19\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.microsoft.com\/on-the-issues\/tag\/covid-19\/\" rel=\"tag\">COVID-19<\/a>, <a aria-label=\"See more stories about disaster response\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.microsoft.com\/on-the-issues\/tag\/disaster-response\/\" rel=\"tag\">disaster response<\/a>, <a aria-label=\"See more stories about human rights\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.microsoft.com\/on-the-issues\/tag\/human-rights-2\/\" rel=\"tag\">human rights<\/a>, <a aria-label=\"See more stories about Microsoft Philanthropies\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.microsoft.com\/on-the-issues\/tag\/microsoft-philanthropies\/\" rel=\"tag\">Microsoft Philanthropies<\/a>, <a aria-label=\"See more stories about Refugees\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.microsoft.com\/on-the-issues\/tag\/refugees\/\" rel=\"tag\">Refugees<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Last December, before the onset of COVID-19, I had the opportunity to visit Zaatari in Jordan \u2013 the world\u2019s largest camp for Syrian refugees \u2013 to learn more about the challenges and opportunities refugees face. I met a young girl, Doha, who was participating in a computing class. I asked her what she thought about [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":118464,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[152,50],"class_list":["post-118463","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-microsoft-news","tag-microsoft-on-the-issues","tag-recent-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118463","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=118463"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118463\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/118464"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=118463"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=118463"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=118463"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}