Title

AWS re:Invent 2023 - Serving Marginalized Populations Through Research and Data Science (IDE107)

Summary

Finca International is a global nonprofit fighting systemic poverty, providing solutions like microloans, clean water, and energy access to 14 million people worldwide.
The talk focused on the problem of exclusion, particularly in data and research, and how traditional research tools are inadequate for including poor people in the information economy.
Finca is developing a solution called Aura, an automated research assistant using AI and AWS services to accelerate knowledge acquisition and create a more inclusive view of the world.
Aura aims to automate the discovery process in research, handle various data types, and retain knowledge for future use, enhancing decision-making in poverty alleviation.
The solution leverages AWS services such as Amazon Bedrock for topic building and targeted content retrieval, Amazon Neptune for visualizing relationships in knowledge graphs, and a combination of Amazon Bedrock and OpenSearch for a Q&A system.
The system is still in the prototyping phase, and the presenters invited feedback, suggestions, and potential collaborations at their booth.

The use of AI and cloud services like AWS can significantly reduce the time and labor involved in traditional research methods, which is crucial for organizations like Finca that aim to end poverty within a generation.
The development of Aura highlights the importance of creating tools that can process and analyze diverse data types, including those not readily available on the web, such as rapid program evaluation data, expert opinions, and investment memos.
By focusing on the needs of excluded communities and leveraging direct access to these populations, Aura's data ingestion and knowledge retention stages are tailored to ensure that the insights generated are relevant and actionable.
The integration of AWS services in Aura's design demonstrates innovative applications of cloud technology in the social sector, potentially setting a precedent for other organizations to follow.
The presentation underscores a shift in the social enterprise sector, where poor people are increasingly seen as agents who, with access to resources and opportunities, can create wealth and improve their circumstances, rather than as recipients of charity.