How coronavirus dashed Ethiopia’s dream of hosting Africa’s first major AI conference

How coronavirus dashed Ethiopia’s dream of hosting Africa’s first major AI conference

Dashed hopes for African AI conference

An April meeting planned to be held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, would have been the first major artificial-intelligence (AI) conference in an African country — until coronavirus forced it to go virtual. The location of the annual International Conference on Learning Representations would have made it more accessible to researchers who cannot readily get visas to Western countries, and given Ethiopia a powerful opportunity to boost its research environment. “Africans and the institutions in Africa missed a chance to make connections and secure important collaborations,” says computer scientist Meareg Hailemariam.

Nature | 5 min read