According to the April 2025 AI Talent Readiness Index report, produced by Qubit Hub and Qhala, Kenya ranked fourth in Africa with a score of 49.70.
The report, which assesses a country’s capacity to develop, retain, and deploy artificial intelligence talent across the pillars of digital skills, data and infrastructure, as well as government readiness, further recommended that each signatory state should consider training at least 15 percent of its population on AI awareness by 2028.
Yet beneath this ambitious goal lies a gap, between AI adoption and AI literacy, between the use of these AI systems and developing the competence required to understand their risks, ethical implications and governance requirements. Which leads to a simple yet meaningful question: Is AI literacy simply a useful skill, or is it becoming a compliance requirement?
Global developments across the world suggest the latter. In April 2025, the US President issued an Executive Order to promote AI competency. Similarly, Beijing formally mandated eight hours of AI education in schools starting September 2025.
In Europe, Article 4 of the European Union’s AI Act, whose supervision and enforcement rules apply from August 3, 2026, requires organisations to ensure that employees and relevant stakeholders possess “sufficient AI literacy”.
Closer to home, the proposed Kenya Artificial Intelligence Bill 2026 offers an early indication of a similar direction. Part V places responsibility on the Artificial Intelligence Commissioner to promote public awareness of AI’s benefits, risks, and ethical implications.
This is significant. When a regulator is tasked with education and capacity building, it typically signals a transition phase from voluntary adoption to expected competence.
In practice, organisations deploying AI systems, especially high-risk systems, will likely need to demonstrate understanding of AI risks, ethics, and governance to meet emerging compliance expectations.
This shift is also being recognised within the corporate sector, as highlighted in the 2025 KPMG Africa CEO Outlook, in which 81 per cent of African CEOs interviewed believe AI upskilling will directly lead to organisational success in the near term.
As a starting point, AI literacy must move beyond general awareness. It is not enough for executives to know “how much return on investment AI will bring”.
Organisations will need structured, role-based training programmes accompanied by clear internal AI Usage guidelines that define acceptable use, accountability, and risk management.
Equally important, both the training and the guidelines should be inclusive and written in simple, accessible language, and delivered in accessible formats, including for persons with disabilities, to ensure that no one is excluded from developing the literacy required to participate safely, and responsibly in an AI-driven society.
Secondly, you cannot regulate what you do not understand, and you cannot comply with rules governing systems you cannot interpret. This is key for Kenya and indeed, for much of the world.
For example, obligations such as transparency, bias mitigation, and risk assessment require not just technical competence but human capability.
That said, regulators are unlikely to assess only the technical performance of AI systems, they will likely assess how organizations understand risks, document processes, and respond to AI failures, including ownership and accountability.
This requires employees and management to have some level of awareness on how AI models function, where risks rise, and to what extent these risks are managed and by who or whom.
Thirdly, the public sector must keep pace. Kenya’s emphasis on institutional capacity building is well placed. Regulators and policymakers will need sufficient AI literacy to interpret the law, enforce it consistently, and adapt it as technology evolves.
Without this foundational understanding, even the most well-designed regulatory framework risks becoming difficult to implement and enforce.
Lastly, considering the projected economic growth of AI in Africa’s economy which is estimated to reach $2.9 trillion by 2030, this will lead to significant transformation for Africa.
Amid this projected growth, AI literacy within organisations, corporate boards, and regulatory institutions, must be fully integrated, not merely as a matter of convenience or competitive advantage, but as an essential foundation for responsible, ethical and inclusive participation in the AI driven society and its emerging regulatory frameworks.
