Gates Foundation: AI Could Help the Poorest Catch Up, or Leave Them Further Behind

On September 15, the Gates Foundation released the 2026 Goalkeepers Report, Make This Matter: AI, Equity, and the Choice We Can't Delay. Goalkeepers tracks progress toward the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which are 17 goals adopted by 193 world leaders in 2015. This year's report is the foundation's 10th, centering on what must happen now so that artificial intelligence (AI) shrinks, rather than grows, the distance between the world's richest and poorest people, and between wealthy and low-income countries. Foundation Chair Bill Gates frames the stakes, saying, "AI could be a great equalizer—or widen the gap. This is not a long-range prediction. It's a present-tense choice."