South Africa Left Off World Bank’s Global AI Strategy Map After April Policy Withdrawal

South Africa does not appear on the World Bank’s global map of economies with a national AI strategy — a direct consequence of the collapse of the country’s draft AI policy in April, and the clearest international cost yet of that failure. The exclusion appears in World Development Report 2026: The Promise of Artificial Intelligence, the Bank’s flagship annual publication released Tuesday. A note beneath the report’s map of national AI strategies states that South Africa “is not included as an e