Student Kasvi Raheja Wins Excellence Award at the Global Development Public Policy Youth Innovation Contest

Kasvi Raheja, a first-year medical student at Ajman University, has won the Excellent Proposal Award (Category 2) at the Global Development Public Policy Youth Innovation Contest (GDPPYI), held under the umbrella of the United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR). The award recognized the innovative proposal she developed with her team to protect UAE cultural heritage amid rapid developments in artificial intelligence.

The contest brought together youth teams from around the world to develop innovative solutions to global development challenges. The final round was hosted by Renmin University of China, where 15 teams were selected to compete in the final stage from approximately 866 teams that applied globally.

Kasvi participated as part of a four-member team and was the only member from Ajman University, alongside three members from Khalifa University in Abu Dhabi. Over a period of three months, the team developed the Cultural Data Protection and Compliance Framework (CDPCF), which aims to protect Nabati poetry in the UAE, a centuries-old Emirati oral tradition, from being used as unregulated data to train artificial intelligence systems without consent or attribution.

The proposal drew on international legal instruments and global approaches related to Indigenous data protection. The team proposed a five-layer framework comprising a Cultural Registry, Cultural Use Labels, Compliance Query Obligation, Creator Councils, and Audit and Benefit-Sharing.

The framework aims to establish a trusted registry of cultural assets, define conditions for using cultural data to train artificial intelligence systems, and require AI developers to verify permissions before using such data. It also gives communities a greater role in determining how their cultural heritage is used, while establishing mechanisms to monitor compliance, address misuse, and ensure that part of the economic value generated from the use of this heritage is returned to the communities concerned.

The achievement reflects Ajman University’s commitment to encouraging its students to use modern technologies and innovation to develop solutions to contemporary issues and challenges, while supporting their participation in international competitions and forums that enable them to apply their academic knowledge in new fields, further developing their skills and broadening their academic and professional experience.