At the event Data For Humanity: How AI is Transforming Development & Business in Latin America, which we helped organize, there was a discussion on how AI can be a catalyst to accelerate development in emerging countries. Governments have the responsibility to become more efficient by adopting Artificial Intelligence.
There is a global trend to create government units aimed at streamlining processes and reducing bureaucratic burden.
According to the latest 2025 Human Development Report by the United Nations Development Programme, global progress in human development has slowed to its lowest level in 35 years. However, the report also highlights a source of optimism: artificial intelligence can play a key role in reversing this trend if it is directed toward reducing inequalities and strengthening state capacities. This vision reinforces the need for governments not to remain on the sidelines of this transformation, but instead become proactive actors in the design and implementation of AI-based solutions.
At Mottum, we are working to empower people and governments through data, and we believe AI is a tool that should be introduced into specific processes. Rather than speaking about AI in vague terms, in this post we want to move away from AI as a buzzword and start discussing concretely how AI can impact the efficiency of government operations.
Below, we outline 7 use cases where AI can be applied in government:
1. Fraud detection and prevention in social programs
AI can analyze large volumes of beneficiary data to identify suspicious patterns or inconsistencies in real time. This helps reduce improper payments and improves the targeting of subsidies, ensuring resources reach those who truly need them.
Example: using machine learning models to detect duplicate or fake identities in conditional cash transfer programs.
2. Automation of procedures and citizen services
AI-powered assistants can handle inquiries, schedule appointments, or process documents 24/7, reducing wait times and physical queues. This frees up operational capacity and improves the citizen experience—especially crucial for local governments with high administrative loads.
3. Audit and oversight prioritization
With the help of specialized AI agents, oversight bodies can identify which projects, contracts, or areas are most likely to present irregularities or mismanagement and prioritize audits accordingly. This strengthens accountability even with limited resources.
4. Citizen assistance agent
AI can enhance virtual assistants capable not only of receiving complaints or requests but also processing and resolving them without human intervention. For example, when a citizen reports a pothole, the system can geolocate it, automatically generate a work order for the relevant department, and update the citizen on the request status. This reduces response times, lowers operational costs, and improves the perception of government efficiency—ideal for simple, high-frequency tasks in local governments.
5. Judicial case prioritization and document management
AI can analyze thousands of legal files to classify, prioritize, and assign cases more efficiently, reducing court backlogs. Large language models, for instance, can read and identify urgent cases (such as gender-based violence, evictions, or children at risk) and assign them priority. It can also automate document reviews, easing the operational burden on the judiciary.
6. AI for optimizing public health resource allocation
AI can integrate hospital, demographic, and epidemiological data to predict demand for hospital beds, medication, or medical staff across regions, facilitating a fairer and more efficient distribution of resources. It also helps identify areas at risk of saturation or shortages before they occur, enabling preventive responses. This is critical in health systems with limited budgets and capacity.
7. Proactive identification of fraudulent contracts
AI can analyze databases of contracts, suppliers, and past bids to detect patterns of corruption, collusion, or overpricing in public procurement. AI makes it possible to identify recurring vendors in rigged bids, inflated prices compared to the market, or links between officials and contractors. This enables governments to trigger early alerts and prioritize audits on high-risk contracts, improving transparency and reducing multimillion-dollar losses.
If we want AI to be a tool for development and not just a slogan, we must anchor its implementation in concrete, measurable, and high-impact processes. At Mottum, we believe that governments today have the opportunity to become smarter, fairer, and more responsive through data and AI. That’s why we are developing a Suite of AI Agents for governments.