DoST marks permanent home for Phl AI innovation

The Department of Science and Technology (DoST) launched the National Artificial Intelligence Center for Research and Innovation (NAICRI) on Thursday, transforming years of fragmented research into a permanent institution designed to anchor the country’s digital future.

The center was unveiled at The Manila Hotel and it will serve as the central hub for advanced computing and the institutional backbone for the National AI Strategy for the Philippines.

DoST Secretary Renato Solidum Jr. said the launch marks a shift from project-based efforts to a scalable national capability.

“For years, Filipino scientists, engineers, and innovators have been building the foundations of our AI future, often without fanfare,” Solidum said. “Today, we give that work a permanent national anchor.”

The center aims to consolidate a decade of isolated technical achievements — ranging from pandemic response platforms to agricultural tools — into a governed framework accessible beyond the capital region.

Among the technologies integrated into the new center is an AI-powered weather forecasting system developed by the DoST’s Advanced Science and Technology Institute.

Project lead Ken Truita said the system aims to provide updates every 15 minutes, a significant increase in frequency from the traditional three-hour intervals. The AI model offers a spatial resolution of 2 kilometers by 2 kilometers, allowing for neighborhood-specific rain forecasts up to 14 days in advance.

“It’s faster and more accurate,” Truita said, noting that while the system is currently undergoing internal validation, it is being refined using localized Philippine atmospheric data.

In the agricultural sector, the DoST introduced ROAMER, an autonomous robot designed to monitor banana plantations. Technical lead Carlo Jonas Cariño said the robot identifies diseases and counts crops in remote areas, acting as a decision-support tool rather than a replacement for human labor.

Addressing data privacy concerns, the department also showcased iTANONG, a localized AI platform similar to ChatGPT. Unlike commercial models, iTANONG allows organizations to query their own databases without uploading sensitive information to external servers.

“The data stays with you,” said lead engineer Aunhel John Adoptante. “You can ask the platform questions about your data... in English, Tagalog, or Taglish.”

The Department of Education is also aligning with the new center to prepare students for an AI-integrated workforce and Education Secretary Sonny Angara said the agency has issued foundational guidelines to ensure “risk-proportionate” AI use in schools.

The DepEd policy explicitly prohibits high-risk AI applications, such as social scoring, biometric emotion recognition, and manipulative chatbots targeting minors.

“Education must be both protected and future-ready,” Angara said. “We will harness AI to close learning gaps... but always with safeguards, transparency, and human oversight.”