CHAPEL HILL – G20 ministers meeting in North Carolina reached consensus on a technology-policy framework called the Carolina Principles for Emerging Technologies, capping a two-day Innovation Ministerial hosted by the U.S. Department of Commerce and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.
The Sept. 1-2 gathering at the Carolina Inn brought government ministers together with executives from some of the world’s largest technology companies. The White House said the resulting ministerial statement covers six areas: pro-innovation policy, technology-driven opportunity, technical workforce development, intellectual property policy for artificial intelligence, AI standards and industrial investment in supply chains.
The Carolina Principles call for countries to invest in foundational research, strengthen pathways for commercializing new technology and enable trusted adoption and deployment. The ministerial also produced AI Prosperity Objectives and an AI Prosperity Compact aimed at technical workforce development and private-sector partnerships.
Reuters reported that the joint statement generally favors using existing legal frameworks for AI and reserving new rules for problems not already covered by current law. China was among the countries that signed the statement.
Copyright policy was a major point of discussion. U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick urged G20 countries to build frameworks that protect creators while allowing AI companies to train models under fair-use principles. Reuters said he did not spell out how countries should determine fair use.
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang urged officials to focus on real-world problems rather than theoretical harms when considering AI regulation. Other speakers included OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, Anthropic co-founder Tom Brown and Palantir CEO Alex Karp.
The White House said the ministerial included representatives from G20 members and invited participants spanning North America, Europe, Asia, South America, Africa and the Middle East.
Sources