Mainstream scientific and traditional knowledge systems have the potential to restore degraded habitats, enhance biodiversity-based enterprise incomes and mitigate climate-induced disasters. However, traditional knowledge systems are at increasing risk of not being transmitted intergenerationally. On the other hand, mainstream scientific knowledge systems are rarely translated into community-relevant content. Together, these barriers to knowledge transmission hamper the pursuit of human wellbeing and biodiversity conservation locally. The Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (ATREE) has elected to use an AI-first strategy to reverse this. ATREE is building a set of ChatGPT-powered WhatsApp chatbots (GramaMitra) so local communities and other stakeholders can access scientifically curated knowledge to (a) sustain and enhance their biodiversity-based livelihoods, (b) restore agroecosystems, and (c) conserve and manage biodiversity in their surrounding landscapes. ATREE’s GramaMitra chatbot will provide user-friendly, interactive and efficient ways to access information with a conversational interface. Users will be able to instantly address queries and obtain context-specific, summarised responses in their own languages, without having to browse multiple webpages.