Lebanon Finance Minister Says AI Will Shape Economic Recovery

What happened

Lebanon's Finance Minister, Yassine Jaber, has said artificial intelligence will play a major role in the country's future as it works towards economic stability. Speaking to The National during a discussion at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, Mr Jaber said AI would shape Lebanon and the wider world.

His remarks came alongside an update from Kamal Shehadi, Lebanon's Minister of State for Technology and AI, who was appointed in 2025. Mr Shehadi announced that 2,500 Lebanese residents had taken part in an AI training programme organised by Zaka, a Middle East-based online education platform.

The reporting also noted that the UAE and Saudi Arabia have invested heavily in AI, and that economists and experts believe the technology could fuel unprecedented innovation across the region.

Why it matters

This story is less about a single AI product than about a government placing AI at the centre of its national development thinking. When a finance ministry and a dedicated technology ministry both frame AI as relevant to economic recovery, it suggests that adoption is moving from isolated pilots towards decisions about how public services are organised and delivered. For leaders in experience and digital transformation, the practical question is how AI is designed into service journeys, not simply whether it is adopted.

The training figure matters for the same reason. Skills programmes at scale connect national ambition to day-to-day service quality. Staff and citizens who understand what AI can and cannot do are better placed to redesign processes around the people they serve. Mr Shehadi's stated aim, as reported, is to integrate AI into work, services and centres of excellence such as higher education, which puts people and services ahead of tools.

By the numbers

• 2,500 Lebanese residents took part in the AI training programme organised by Zaka, according to Minister of State Kamal Shehadi.
• 2025 is the year Mr Shehadi was appointed Minister of State for Technology and AI.

The Renascence take

Most readers will hear a finance minister discuss AI and file it under macroeconomics. The more useful reading is that this is a service-design story. National AI ambition only becomes customer value when the people using public services notice a difference.

Most readers will miss that national AI strategy is, at its core, a question of friction. Adoption follows where effort is removed and trust is earned, so the real test for any ministry is whether a citizen completes a task faster and with less uncertainty. Operators, public or private, should map their highest-volume customer journeys first and ask where AI genuinely removes effort, rather than where it simply sounds modern. Training 2,500 people is a start, but the behavioural payoff comes when those skills change the moments that customers actually experience.