Description
Can an algorithm anticipate a flood or help a farmer better irrigate their crops? The answer is yes, and there are eight teams in Latin America that are already proving it.
Climate change is not a problem of the future. It is a reality that today displaces families, destroys crops, collapses infrastructures and puts biodiversity at risk. Faced with this scenario, technology and, specifically, the combination of open data and artificial intelligence are a powerful tool to build smarter, faster and more effective solutions.
In this post we want to present eight projects selected within the framework of the Open Data and AI Innovation Challenge (Data2AIChallenge), an initiative promoted by the Open Data Charter (ODC) with the support of the Patrick J. McGovern Foundation and the governments of Colombia and Uruguay. These eight teams have been chosen from all the proposals received to receive six months of specialized mentoring with which to bring their ideas to reality.
What is Data2AIChallenge?
The Data2AIChallenge is a regional call focused on climate action that seeks to support the development of projects that reuse open public data and apply artificial intelligence to respond to specific environmental challenges in Colombia and Uruguay.
Its objectives are:
- Encourage citizen participation.
- Promote ethical and innovative uses of AI and open data.
- To make visible solutions with real impact.
The call accepted proposals from students, developers, journalists, activists and researchers. A multidisciplinary jury (made up of specialists in open government, climate change and digital transformation from institutions such as the Development Bank of Latin America, the Agency for Electronic Government and the Information and Knowledge Society of Uruguay and the Ministry of ICT of Colombia) evaluated the proposals according to criteria of innovation, relevance and methodological rigor.
Of these, eight projects were selected that demonstrate that open data can be a lever for change in the environmental sector.
The eight selected projects
1. Alerta Yí: early warnings of floods with citizen science
The Yí River basin, in Uruguay, is an area recurrently affected by floods. The Alerta Yí team proposes a participatory early warning system that integrates open data, artificial intelligence models and citizen science. The aim is both to anticipate risk and to build community resilience, i.e. for communities themselves to be an active part of the surveillance and response system.
This type of hybrid approach between technology and citizen participation is especially valuable in contexts where institutional resources are limited and local knowledge is essential.
2. Minga Abierta: community mapping to prevent risks in Medellín
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The slopes of Medellín (Colombia) concentrate popular neighborhoods with high exposure to landslides and floods. The Pluriverse Narrative Collective, responsible for the Minga Abierta project, combines community cartography, citizen science and predictive models to anticipate climate risks.
The name of the project is no coincidence: "minga" is a word of Quechua origin that refers to collective work. The proposal understands that data without community is not enough, and that risk prevention is also an act of social organization.
3. AgroClima Platform: smart irrigation prescriptions for family farming
Water stress directly threatens the food security of small producers in the Municipality of Magdalena (Colombia). AgroClima Platform uses artificial intelligence and open-access satellite data to generate accurate irrigation prescriptions tailored to each plot.
This is a very clear example of the democratizing potential of open data. Because climate information that was previously only available to large agro-industrial farms can now be put at the service of family farmers who most need to adapt to climate change.
4. Robo-Threat: AI to open environmental files
How many environmental impact assessment processes are buried in dense and inaccessible documents? Roboto Threat applies generative AI to transform these files into open data that can be audited, understandable and reusable by any citizen.
This project defends a fundamental premise: transparency is not just about publishing data, but about making that data understandable and actionable. When citizens can understand what the environmental files say, accountability becomes real. It should be noted that Amenaza Roboto already has a previous trajectory: it was the winning team in a previous challenge organized by the ODC itself in Uruguay in 2022.
5. Urban Light: light pollution maps to protect biodiversity
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Light pollution is one of the least obvious forms of pollution, but with documented effects on biodiversity, the circadian cycles of animals and plants, and also on human health. Luz Urbana uses big data and artificial intelligence to cross-reference satellite images with urban data and generate maps of light pollution in Uruguay.
The project represents an innovative use of open geospatial data to address an environmental problem that is routinely left out of local political agendas.
6. Recyclables Observatory: climate decisions based on waste data
How to compare the climate impact of different waste management policies? The Recyclables Observatory project, promoted by CEMPRE Uruguay, answers these questions by applying open data, IPCC methodology and artificial intelligence to measure the climate impact of recycling decisions on a territorial scale.
The value of this proposal lies in transforming scattered data on waste into comparable and actionable indicators that can guide evidence-based public policies.
7. Slope Guardians: Actionable weather alerts against landslides
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Colombia is one of the countries in the world with the highest incidence of landslides. Guardianes de la Ladera transforms open geospatial data into local climate alerts, using artificial intelligence to anticipate landslides with traceable evidence and communicate them in a way that can guide concrete decisions at the community level.
The proposal focuses on a classic problem of warning systems: the gap between general forecasts and local decisions.
8. BIO-AI: Data Journalism to Defend the Amazon
The Amazonian piedmont in Caquetá (Colombia) is home to a wealth of endemic species threatened by deforestation and habitat loss. BIO-AI combines artificial intelligence and data journalism to build conservation-oriented audiovisual experiences. The proposal understands that in order for scientific data to reach the public, they must be converted into stories that people can understand and that mobilize wills.
In a context where the Amazon continues to be subject to political disputes and economic pressures, projects like this show that knowledge, when communicated well, can be a tool for territorial defense.
What do these projects teach us?
Beyond their particularities, the eight selected projects share a series of features that are worth highlighting:
- Open data is the infrastructure for climate action. Without free access to satellite, climate, geospatial or waste data, none of these projects would be possible. The opening of public data allows citizen innovation to flourish.
- AI is a tool, not a magic bullet. All these teams use artificial intelligence at the service of a specific problem, with real data and clear objectives. But AI is not the idea itself, but a tool to obtain better results.
- Citizen participation amplifies impact. Several of these projects integrate citizen science and community mapping. This not only improves the quality of the data; it also generates local ownership of solutions.
- Open data reduces gaps. Family farmers, hillside communities, flood zone dwellers: the selected projects put the most sophisticated tools at the service of those who need them most.
Conclusion: When Open Data Becomes Action
The eight projects of the Data2AIChallenge are a practical demonstration that the opening of public data, combined with artificial intelligence and citizen engagement, can generate concrete solutions to real climate problems. From the slopes of Medellín to the Amazonian foothills, from the fields of Magdalena to the illuminated nights of Uruguay, these initiatives show that change does not always come from large institutions or millionaire budgets: sometimes it is born from small teams, with good questions, access to open data and a willingness to transform their environment.
The challenge now is to continue expanding the availability, quality and usability of public climate data, and to accompany those who want to use it to build a more resilient world. Because open data is the starting point for everything that is to come.
