A Ghanaian PhD student at Texas Tech University advocates stronger protection for AI Data workers in Africa

Ghanaian PhD student Mr Jeffery Acheampong Adu, currently enrolled at Texas Tech University, has urged for enhanced legal and policy safeguards for workers who contribute to the development of artificial intelligence (AI) systems. Adu conveyed his findings during the 2026 Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication (AEJMC) Conference held in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Titled "Data Workers in the AI Supply Chain: An Exploratory Study of the Legal and Policy Protections Governing Digital Labour," his research investigates the recognition and protection of AI data workers under global, African regional, and Ugandan legal and policy frameworks.

The study challenges the prevailing notion that AI operates solely through automation, instead emphasizing the crucial role of human labor in activities such as data annotation, content moderation, data cleaning, verification, and more. While prior scholarship has successfully illuminated the hidden labor behind AI, Adu's research highlights a lack of focus on the legal and policy protections established by global, regional, and national bodies to safeguard these workers and identify any existing gaps in these frameworks.

By analyzing Uganda's human-rights, labor, data-protection, cybersecurity, and digital-development policies as a case study, Adu discovered that AI data workers are not explicitly categorized as a distinct legal entity. Instead, they are protected indirectly as persons, employees, workers, citizens, and data subjects. Furthermore, the findings indicate that Uganda's Employment Act provides valuable labor protections; however, access to these protections may hinge on whether a worker is officially recognized as an employee.

This situation renders freelancers, outsourced workers, subcontractors, and platform workers uncertain about their rights and protections.

Adu advocates for a shift in AI governance towards not only safeguarding data, systems, and innovation but also focusing on protecting the individuals who underpin AI. He emphasizes the need for clearer recognition of AI data work as legitimate labor and calls for stronger protections encompassing fair pay, safe working conditions, mental-health support, worker privacy, collective voice, and access to legal remedies.

His study adds to the ongoing discourse surrounding AI governance in Africa, demonstrating that the challenge lies not just in the absence of legal protections but in the fragmented and uneven manner in which existing protections apply to emerging forms of digital labor.