As 2025 unfolds, Chile is emerging as a regional leader in the responsible and strategic use of artificial intelligence (AI) in government. Fueled by policy, investment, and pilot programs, the public sector is gearing up to modernize, streamline, reskill, and protect citizens — all while navigating ethical, regulatory, and practical challenges.

National Strategy and Legal Framework

Chile’s approach to AI in government is neither ad-hoc nor reactive. The Chilean AI Policy 2021-2030, led by the Ministry of Science, Technology, Knowledge and Innovation (Minscience), lays out three guiding pillars: enabling factors; development & adoption; and ethics, regulation & socio-economic impact. (nucamp.co)

In May 2024 a draft AI Bill was introduced, adopting an EU-style, risk-based framework: establishments such as an AI Commission, a national registry, pre-authorisation for high-risk systems, and bans on certain uses (for example, broad remote biometric identification in public spaces) were proposed. The law is oriented toward ensuring oversight, transparency, ethics, and human-centred safeguards. Government bodies will need to build strong governance, procurement, documentation, and risk assessment capacities.

Infrastructure, Investment, and Regional Context

Chile has been investing heavily in the foundational infrastructure needed for large-scale AI deployment. As of 2025, there are ~58 data centres in operation with about 150 MW of colocation capacity. A National Data Center Plan expects US$2.5 billion in investment, and anticipates 28 new facilities. Projected total capacity may reach ~250 MW with additional power investments.

These capacities—both compute and regulatory—are vital for lowering latency, improving data sovereignty, and enabling public sector AI applications that don’t rely on external infrastructure. In short, the groundwork is being laid for Chilean government agencies to run AI workloads internally with better control.

Practical Use Cases in the Government

Chile is not waiting to scale before starting. Several pilot projects are already in motion:

• SUSESO (Social Security & Medical Insurance Agency) has engaged in AI-powered models: a gradient-boosting model for medical claims to speed up adjudication, and a classification-tree audit for occupational mental health claims. With hundreds of thousands of claims processed each year, these tools both promise efficiency and pose challenges of fairness and accuracy.

• GobLab is helping with algorithmic transparency, including developing tools like a Report Card for algorithms and statistical bias measurement; ChileCompra is revising procurement terms to include criteria such as explainability and data protection.

Generative AI is also in focus: studies suggest ~4.7 million workers could have over 30% of their tasks accelerated using AI, which theoretically could translate into substantial gains in GDP. For the public sector alone, simplification of routine administrative tasks could deliver over US$1.1 billion annually in savings and improved efficiency.

Risks, Ethics, and What to Watch

With opportunity comes responsibility. The draft AI Bill seeks to address this: risk-based classification of systems, human oversight, documentation, and transparency are no longer optional.

Key issues still to resolve include:

• Defining liability (who’s responsible when AI decisions go wrong)

• Capacity for enforcement (does the government have enough trained staff, regulatory oversight bodies, audit tools)

• Procurement reform (ensuring contracts with vendors include audits, explainability, bias testing, appropriate safeguards)

• Human-in-the-loop workflows so AI assists rather than replaces in sensitive or rights-impacting decisions.

Roadmap: How Chilean Agencies Can Move Forward

To make AI useful rather than something that creates risk or division, Chilean government organizations should follow a clear operational roadmap:

1. Start with multistakeholder advisory groups — bring together public, private, civil society, academia to align values, priorities, and skills.

2. Conduct AI Opportunity Audits — identify which processes are most amenable to automation or augmentation, with measurable KPIs.

3. Pilot, prototype, scale carefully — Proof of Concept → Prototype → Pilot → Minimum Viable Product; exit criteria and timelines.

4. Embed safeguards from the start — vendor documentation, liability clauses, data sharing agreements, audits.

5. Local or municipal pilots / thin slices before attempting national deployment, to manage scale, diversity, and context.

6. Leverage academia and research institutions for evaluation, legitimacy, shared learning.

7. Invest in workforce reskilling and capacity building, especially for non-technical staff — prompt engineering, risk awareness, ethics

2025 is a pivotal year for AI in the Chilean government. The convergence of policy, infrastructure, pilots, and investment gives Chile a rare opportunity to both lead and balance — to harness productivity gains while protecting citizens’ rights. If the country can build enforcement capacity, ensure transparency, and embed ethics into procurement and operations, it will have not only a competitive advantage but, more importantly, a public service that is more responsive, efficient, and trustworthy. The coming years will show whether Chile can make regulation a strength rather than a bottleneck — and whether the promise of AI in government becomes the lived reality of all Chileans.