JAKARTA - The International Labour Organization said on July 8 that generative AI may affect nearly 80 million workers across ASEAN. The figure comes from ILO estimates for 2025 in the brief Generative AI and labour markets in ASEAN: Significant exposure, limited disruption, uneven preparedness.
The brief said 22.9 per cent of total employment in ASEAN is in occupations with more than minimal potential exposure to generative AI. Only 3.3 per cent of the workforce, or 11.7 million workers, falls into the highest exposure category, and around 67 per cent of employment has no identified generative AI exposure.
The ILO study examines generative AI’s implications for jobs and labour markets across the 11 countries of ASEAN. It considers occupational exposure and early adoption patterns, meaning the figures measure where generative AI could affect work tasks, not where job losses have already happened.
“The potential for labour market transformation is significant, but widespread disruption is not yet visible,” the brief said.
Among the nine ASEAN countries with available data, Singapore had the highest share of workers with more than minimal generative AI exposure, at 42.2 per cent of employment. The Philippines followed at 28.1 per cent, then Indonesia at 21.7 per cent, Viet Nam at 20.8 per cent and Thailand at 20.6 per cent.
The report also found a gender gap in high-exposure occupations. Women are more than twice as likely as men to work in jobs with high generative AI exposure, reflecting their concentration in clerical, administrative and professional roles. Young workers aged 15 to 24 and adult workers showed broadly similar levels of exposure.
The ILO said employment in highly exposed occupations has continued to expand across ASEAN. Generative AI adoption is still early and uneven, with use concentrated in technology-intensive occupations. Office and administrative roles show high exposure, but the brief said uptake in those jobs remains comparatively limited.
Singapore’s lead in the ILO exposure ranking sits alongside its stronger AI adoption base. Salesforce’s Global AI Readiness Index said on July 31, 2025, that Singapore ranked second globally in overall AI readiness across 16 markets, first globally in AI adoption and regulatory readiness, and first in Asia-Pacific for AI readiness.
The same gap is visible in Singapore’s infrastructure push. IMDA’s Green Data Centre Roadmap, launched on May 30, 2024, said Singapore’s data-centre capacity already exceeded 1.4 gigawatts and targeted at least 300 megawatts of additional capacity in the near term, with another 200 megawatts possible through green-energy deployments.
The roadmap said AI workloads can require 20 kilowatts to more than 100 kilowatts per rack.
