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Blockchain and the Sustainable Development Goals
This gives them absolute control over their own money, independent of any male members in their family. It provides public, private, and non-governmental organisations with the knowledge and tools that enable human progress, economic development, and nature conservation to take place together. The IUCN is looking to utilize blockchain to administer its Green List of Global Conservation areas, which encourages and supports the creation of new and protected conservation sites around the world.
Blockchain offers a reduction of bank fees, more transparency about Green List funding, and progress towards meeting its goals. This way, the IUCN can guarantee that donor funds go straight to the site they want to help.
Blockchain is also said to possible improve the system of carbon asset transactions. UN Climate Change UNFCC believes that recording carbon assets on a public blockchain could guarantee transparency and ensure that transactions are valid and settled automatically. All of these entities seek to use blockchain technology to give refugees a digital identity.
They have currently teamed up with Accenture and are looking at rolling out an inter-operable, user-owned and controlled digital identity to its hundreds of thousands of staff. They hope that this initiative will evolve to a standard background check which can be distributed to potential clients using a biometrics system that can manage data on fingerprints and irises.
Blockchains enable trust which would, in turn, help mitigate corruption. Current international and domestic governance models are wrought with bureaucracy, red tape, and inefficiencies, which hinders access to these key governance structures.
Blockchain strengthens trust, and promotes information sharing between institutions and the public. It can have an impact on democratic voting models and promote the principles of good governance.
A blockchain operates on the principles of consensus, accountability and transparency between all parties. For example, fish might be traded on a platform only if harvest quotas were approved by a community-based democratic process. By digitizing governance models and facilitating the creation of digital societies, such as e-Estonia , achieving access to just and peaceful institutions is definitely attainable.
Bitcoin, for example, is slow. Ethereum is an improvement but more are required before it can be universally applied. With the ongoing blurring lines between the real and digital world, there have been increasing concerns of data ownership and access to services.
With all of these innovations, there needs to be adequate protections in place to protect the identities of refugees or stateless individuals. There is also the issue of the digital divide.
Through the use of blockchain, it could be possible to ensure the availability of more affordable, equitable and quality educational content internationally. In the COVID pandemic, educational institutions globally have quickly pivoted to online learning, and are examining their long-term strategies.
Online learning, probably in different formats blended with classroom learning, is here to stay. This change ensures the continuing importance of blockchain and open educational resources. However, there are challenges in using blockchain in education. Policy-makers concerned with development in conjunction with educators should explore ways to address challenges in disseminating open educational resources with blockchain while advocating for the internet infrastructure necessary required to support it.
Read more: Demystifying the blockchain: a basic user guide. Open educational resources are not limited to textbooks, lessons or curriculum. They can also be educational games, podcasts, videos and applications. They substantially reduce the cost of content to students. They have also been used to empower teachers and learners through increased timely access to quality content, which improves learning.
Blockchain can be described as a digital ledger or database that is distributed on a network. Blockchain can support the dissemination of open educational resources on a global scale. Blockchain has become more widely known due to its use in Bitcoin as a ledger for financial transactions that are secured with encryption, verified and recorded by network nodes also called a digital cryptocurrency.
Bitcoin is based on blockchain, but the technology has many other uses. The original records cannot be deleted or changed. We are now in a liminal period for digital technologies.
Nearly all the benefits of having access to computing power were previously kept inside corporations. Information technology was primarily about following the same business processes in place since the s but doing so faster, more efficiently and more securely. With the broadscale distribution of computing power across the globe, however, something shifted. Many of the technologies driven by the distribution of computational capacity are about radically redefining how those business processes, our economy and our society are defined in the first place.
In effect, placing the power of digital into so many hands is having a significant impact on all aspects of human existence. Blockchain is one of the technologies enabled by the worldwide distribution of computing capacity. Put simply, blockchain is a digital ledger in which transactions, e. It is the public aspect of this exchange that is the most interesting.
Now, having moved far beyond its original application within cryptocurrency, the underlying technology of Bitcoin is being applied in a variety of situations, from incentivizing the inclusion of renewables in energy networks, thus reducing emissions in the global shipping industry, to enabling banks to perform remittances faster and at a lower cost.
There is a significant amount of hype about blockchain, as well as misconception, driven in part by the fact that it is extremely new and in part by greed, as people have realized that they are able to make money from blockchain as a new form of asset class.
Blockchain, however, does not exist in a vacuum and it indeed functions within a political economy, like every other technology.
Moreover, the idea that a currency can exist without Governments getting involved is a fallacy; there is nothing more political than money. What can blockchain give us, then? Blockchain is still new and will evolve many times before it can be fully integrated into society.
We have seen similar trajectories before in the technology industry; examples include the Internet of things, mobile telephony and even the Internet itself. Every one of those technologies went through various iterations before it was fully integrated and used within society. Many technical, social and political obstacles had to be slowly but surely overcome. It is often useful, therefore, to approach emerging technologies with some depth of thought—not by expecting them to act immediately as a fully functional solution but rather as a lens on the possible.
Such an approach allows for a broader discussion, one in which we can challenge our preconceived notions. Blockchain has already illustrated the power of individuals connected via the Internet with sufficient computing power at their disposal. Far from merely tweeting, or taking and sharing photos or videos, such people can also create an entirely new economic structure.
Each of these goals has targets to achieve, totalling different targets. The SDGs cover a broad range of social and economic development issues including poverty, hunger, health, education, gender equality, clean water, sanitation, energy, environment, and social justice. UN Aid programs have been wrought with countless cases of fraud, red tape, hefty administrative fees and mismanagement of funds. In order to provide the maximum amount of aid to those who need it the most, the World Food Programme WFP implemented a pilot project in called Building Blocks.
Within months, the WFP expanded the pilot to a Syrian refugee camp in Azraq, Jordan to successfully facilitate cash transfers for over 10, Syrian refugees on its blockchain payments platform. According to CCN , the implementation of blockchain technology also enabled Syrian refugees to buy food from local retailers using a biometric scan of their eye where each transaction was recorded on a blockchain, rendering the use of cash, bank cards, and paper vouchers obsolete.
In this case, the refugees did not need to share any sensitive data with banks or mobile operators, benefiting from greater security and privacy through an immutable, secure blockchain.
Now, the World Food Programme is currently expanding its Ethereum-based blockchain after saving millions of dollars in bank transfers by utilizing decentralised blockchain technology. Currently, the WFP feeds over million people across 80 countries. This organ of the UN is dedicated to gender equity and the empowerment of women and was established to accelerate progress of meeting their needs worldwide.
The Blockchain simulation lab addressed humanitarian scenarios around identity. According to Jordan Daniell , Blockchain could provide a platform where storing identification documents as a viable way of proving their identity, in a humanitarian scenario. Daniell believes that authorities could also identity women or girls who have been trafficked or who have gone missing. The simulation lab is a create first step merging the pursuit of Gender equality and addressing other intersecting sustainable development goals.
The winners of this hackathon was Olivier Mukuta and his team. This gives them absolute control over their own money, independent of any male members in their family. It provides public, private, and non-governmental organisations with the knowledge and tools that enable human progress, economic development, and nature conservation to take place together. The IUCN is looking to utilize blockchain to administer its Green List of Global Conservation areas, which encourages and supports the creation of new and protected conservation sites around the world.
Blockchain offers a reduction of bank fees, more transparency about Green List funding, and progress towards meeting its goals. This way, the IUCN can guarantee that donor funds go straight to the site they want to help.
Blockchain is also said to possible improve the system of carbon asset transactions. UN Climate Change UNFCC believes that recording carbon assets on a public blockchain could guarantee transparency and ensure that transactions are valid and settled automatically. All of these entities seek to use blockchain technology to give refugees a digital identity. They have currently teamed up with Accenture and are looking at rolling out an inter-operable, user-owned and controlled digital identity to its hundreds of thousands of staff.
They hope that this initiative will evolve to a standard background check which can be distributed to potential clients using a biometrics system that can manage data on fingerprints and irises.
Blockchains enable trust which would, in turn, help mitigate corruption. Current international and domestic governance models are wrought with bureaucracy, red tape, and inefficiencies, which hinders access to these key governance structures. Blockchain strengthens trust, and promotes information sharing between institutions and the public.
It can have an impact on democratic voting models and promote the principles of good governance. A blockchain operates on the principles of consensus, accountability and transparency between all parties. For example, fish might be traded on a platform only if harvest quotas were approved by a community-based democratic process.
By digitizing governance models and facilitating the creation of digital societies, such as e-Estonia , achieving access to just and peaceful institutions is definitely attainable.
Bitcoin, for example, is slow. When the unknown person going by the name of Satoshi Nakamoto created blockchain technology in , he had a single vision: a peer-to-peer electronic cash system. The ability to be integrated into various industries from logistics to healthcare, from energy to agriculture has led to blockchain being referred to by many as a disruptive innovation. Although blockchain is gaining popularity quickly, it has yet to be embraced by the public sector.
At the same time, there are many unanswered questions. Blockchain4SDGs Alliance brings together institutions and global leaders to provide thought leadership and investment advisory to scale up blockchain4SDGs solutions.
The global Blockchain4SDGs Roundtable was held in January in Washington DC and participated by around industrial leaders, investors, and policy makers from all over the world. The event featured some of the most promising blockchain for SDGs solutions in areas such as energy trading, digital asset management, economic identity of the poor and healthcare including several Chinese blockchain applications.
Robert Zakon, the White House Presidential Innovation Fellow, shared the latest initiatives that were currently being taken to accelerate innovation, such as blockchain technology in the U. Ying Cao, from Energy Blockchain lab, introduced their ground breaking blockchain based emissions trading application with great length.
Shanyuan APP combines blockchain technology with big data to induce positive philanthropical behaviors. Seratio Blockchain 2. Its application in other sectors will bring even more trans-formative changes to our life in the future. Since SDGs are highly relevant to the welfare of the whole society, government and other public agencies need to get actively engaged in the conversation to fully harness the power of blockchain technology.
From its birth, the technological advancement of blockchain is through global collaboration. This is the first of many events held around the world over the coming year, by Blockchain4SDGs Alliance, to develop collaborative initiatives that brings blockchain solutions to emerging markets. One hundred SDGs focused blockchain start-ups and small businesses will be selected as a part of an acceleration program called Blockchain The purpose of the program is to support these businesses to grow in revenue and size, as well as enter into new markets over the next three years.
Due to the size of the market and fast growth of both the talent and industry, China will play a growing important role in participating and facilitating such global dialogue and collaborations. By Rituparna Ghosh, Xiaochen Zhang When the unknown person going by the name of Satoshi Nakamoto created blockchain technology in , he had a single vision: a peer-to-peer electronic cash system.
Blockchain and Sustainable Growth
Ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all. Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all. Build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster innovation. Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development. Protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, and halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss.
Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels.
Strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the global partnership for sustainable development. The ability to be integrated into various industries from logistics to healthcare, from energy to agriculture has led to blockchain being referred to by many as a disruptive innovation. Although blockchain is gaining popularity quickly, it has yet to be embraced by the public sector.
At the same time, there are many unanswered questions. Blockchain4SDGs Alliance brings together institutions and global leaders to provide thought leadership and investment advisory to scale up blockchain4SDGs solutions. The global Blockchain4SDGs Roundtable was held in January in Washington DC and participated by around industrial leaders, investors, and policy makers from all over the world. The event featured some of the most promising blockchain for SDGs solutions in areas such as energy trading, digital asset management, economic identity of the poor and healthcare including several Chinese blockchain applications.
Robert Zakon, the White House Presidential Innovation Fellow, shared the latest initiatives that were currently being taken to accelerate innovation, such as blockchain technology in the U.
Ying Cao, from Energy Blockchain lab, introduced their ground breaking blockchain based emissions trading application with great length. Shanyuan APP combines blockchain technology with big data to induce positive philanthropical behaviors. Seratio Blockchain 2. Its application in other sectors will bring even more trans-formative changes to our life in the future.
Since SDGs are highly relevant to the welfare of the whole society, government and other public agencies need to get actively engaged in the conversation to fully harness the power of blockchain technology. From its birth, the technological advancement of blockchain is through global collaboration.
This is the first of many events held around the world over the coming year, by Blockchain4SDGs Alliance, to develop collaborative initiatives that brings blockchain solutions to emerging markets. One hundred SDGs focused blockchain start-ups and small businesses will be selected as a part of an acceleration program called Blockchain The purpose of the program is to support these businesses to grow in revenue and size, as well as enter into new markets over the next three years.
Due to the size of the market and fast growth of both the talent and industry, China will play a growing important role in participating and facilitating such global dialogue and collaborations. By Rituparna Ghosh, Xiaochen Zhang When the unknown person going by the name of Satoshi Nakamoto created blockchain technology in , he had a single vision: a peer-to-peer electronic cash system.
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Far from merely tweeting, or taking and sharing photos or videos, such people can also create an entirely new economic structure. The power of blockchain thus lies not in the technology itself but rather in how it has reframed many discussions across various parts of our society and economy.
Blockchain shows us that there are options, that we can organize society differently. It has launched 1, different thought experiments but the resulting solutions, which will be delivered a decade or two from now, may or may not be based on blockchain or cryptocurrencies.
The discussions that started from this point, however, will have been important contributions to the progress that society makes around digital technologies and what they can mean for humankind. For these reasons, it is important that everyone, including the United Nations, engage with these technologies to understand and learn from them. At its most basic level, blockchain speaks to a deep, human need, one of being able to trust other people, organizations and companies in a world where most of our interactions are mediated and stored digitally.
It is arguable how well it captures that notion of trust, or whether any technology can ever actually replicate what a human being thinks, feels and acts like when they trust and are trusted.
These concepts are deeply human, as are the power structures within which digital solutions are built. Blockchain is often discussed as removing intermediaries or creating democratic solutions to problems, but it may merely replace existing analogue power structures with digital ones, and cause decision-making within such contexts to become more brutally binary.
Context is critical for the development of any technology, as is the political economy within which it exists. Those who have tried to use blockchain, however, have quickly realized something: it forces a new level of cooperation. It requires partnerships and deep discussions of what transparency and inclusion truly look like.
In the same way that the technology of the Industrial Revolution was a response to the changes in society during that period, so too is blockchain a response to ongoing changes in our own era.
Blockchain appeals to many people as a viable solution precisely because it is about applying a counter-intuitive approach to problems; despite the often technology-deterministic manner in which it is discussed, it is important to listen to the underlying message.
The call to inclusion, trust and multilateralism that blockchain attempts to address from a technical perspective is one that will continue for many decades to come and one to which we must find new ways to respond via Governments, civil society, academia, non-governmental organizations and international organizations such as the United Nations.
A key issue that needs to be approached multilaterally is the regulation of digital technologies. Although several initiatives have been developed worldwide to establish such regulation, we must broaden the understanding of those efforts as well as the principles of human rights across the digital industry.
Blockchain, for example, is truly cross-border; it knows no national boundaries as either a currency or a technology and it demands a unified, multilateral approach to regulation. It also requires that those working in the civil services across the world be more than just technically aware; they need to understand how their regulations may be interpreted in code. Smart contracts and their ilk require diversity of thought and thus inclusion.
We cannot leave the codification of social norms into smart contracts to be handled solely by start-ups or by young men, since the manner in which they are implemented has an impact on a large number of people and therefore needs to be managed across society. More importantly, code written in one country under a certain set of laws may have an impact on the citizens of another country. How these situations will be handled has yet to be defined. Education is critical, not just for civil service or government leaders but for everyone.
In the same way that we learn the rules of the road before driving, we need to be taught how to manage the data highways upon which our society is now being built. Research has shown that only about one third of the population can understand the data and statistics that form the outputs of the open data movement.
Blockchain goes much further, requiring that citizens accept a completely new approach to data management, and have some understanding of cryptography and key management principles, or face losing their money or government services.
To transition to a fully digital economy without updating our education systems is a sure recipe for disaster. It is by creating appropriate multilateral solutions that we can address our current emerging technologies and have reasonable frames of reference for ones that have not even been thought of yet.
Rather than accepting or rejecting such technologies outright, we must give them careful consideration and work together to assess and address their impact. It is likely that the key legacy of blockchain will be that when computing power is handed to a large part of the population—rather than solely housed in corporations—completely new solutions to old problems will emerge.
In the case of blockchain, it began with a desire to see a new form of banking system, one that was truly native to the digital world we are all starting to inhabit. Adaptations require the creation of a new block that is automatically linked to the original. The block-encapsulated open educational resources are incorruptible. When every block in the iteration of a resource is time-stamped and recorded, plagiarism becomes obsolete.
The tracing features of blockchain allow authors to see if or when their work is being misused and allows them to challenge any improper usage. Transactions cannot be hidden, and so every adaptation of the original source is traceable.
New versions of the source can be uploaded. Trackability is maintained as each block or ledger is distributed on the network. This means that resources created with blockchain will have permanence online that preserves all content adaptations. All resources preserved as blockchain records are secured and permanent. This can become very important if an institution disappears, or if a creator moves on to work elsewhere or retires.
Another positive dimension of using blockchain is that it helps overcome the fact that many quality open educational resources are hard to find on the web, and are wasted because of this. To date, there has been no efficient means of disseminating open educational resources that allows for maximum accessibility. Blockchain can effectively support accessibility to open educational resources, housed in publicly available, distributed global knowledge databases. Applying blockchain in education has its own challenges.
These include the difficulty of changing established systems, legal questions on the ownership of the data, limitations in storage space and the need for privacy protection. Recent news on Bitcoin has focused on the total loss of access to the blockchain if a password cannot be retrieved. This human element of remembering passwords could prove a significant inhibitor of the use of blockchain in education. In addition, like other online databases, blockchain is vulnerable to unexpected failures.
The persistence of blockchain can also become a hindrance: If unwanted, fake, unscientific or illegal content is accidentally or maliciously added to a blockchain, it cannot be removed. There is also a lack of people skilled in implementing blockchain. As well, the speed, and particularly the high energy cost of creating and maintaining blockchain are also concerns.
But more research and political will is needed to overcome barriers in implementing this technology. Edition: Available editions United Kingdom. Become an author Sign up as a reader Sign in.
THE 17 GOALS
By Rituparna Ghosh, Xiaochen Zhang When the unknown person going by the name blockchain Satoshi Nakamoto created blockchain technology inhe had a single vision: a peer-to-peer electronic cash development. In the case of blockchain, it began with a desire to see a new form of banking system, one that was truly native goals the digital world sustainable are all starting to inhabit. The original creator can always be determined, no matter how much a resource is changed. Spring Festival The development of this hackathon was Olivier Goals and his team. They hope that this initiative will evolve to a blockchain background check which can be distributed to potential clients using a biometrics system sustainable can manage data on fingerprints and irises.
[UN]BLOCKED Conference 2019 - Blockchain for Sustainability
Now, having moved far beyond its original application within cryptocurrency, the underlying technology of Bitcoin is being applied in a variety of situations, from incentivizing the inclusion of renewables in energy networks, thus reducing emissions in the global shipping industry, to enabling banks to perform remittances faster and at a lower cost.
There is a significant amount of hype about blockchain, as well as misconception, driven in part by the fact that it is extremely new and in part by greed, as people have realized that they are able to make money from blockchain as a new form of asset class.
Blockchain, however, does not exist in a vacuum and it indeed functions within a political economy, like every other technology. Moreover, the idea that a currency can exist without Governments getting involved is a fallacy; there is nothing more political than money.
What can blockchain give us, then? Blockchain is still new and will evolve many times before it can be fully integrated into society. We have seen similar trajectories before in the technology industry; examples include the Internet of things, mobile telephony and even the Internet itself.
Every one of those technologies went through various iterations before it was fully integrated and used within society. Many technical, social and political obstacles had to be slowly but surely overcome. It is often useful, therefore, to approach emerging technologies with some depth of thought—not by expecting them to act immediately as a fully functional solution but rather as a lens on the possible.
Such an approach allows for a broader discussion, one in which we can challenge our preconceived notions. Blockchain has already illustrated the power of individuals connected via the Internet with sufficient computing power at their disposal.
Far from merely tweeting, or taking and sharing photos or videos, such people can also create an entirely new economic structure. The power of blockchain thus lies not in the technology itself but rather in how it has reframed many discussions across various parts of our society and economy.
Blockchain shows us that there are options, that we can organize society differently. It has launched 1, different thought experiments but the resulting solutions, which will be delivered a decade or two from now, may or may not be based on blockchain or cryptocurrencies. The discussions that started from this point, however, will have been important contributions to the progress that society makes around digital technologies and what they can mean for humankind.
For these reasons, it is important that everyone, including the United Nations, engage with these technologies to understand and learn from them. At its most basic level, blockchain speaks to a deep, human need, one of being able to trust other people, organizations and companies in a world where most of our interactions are mediated and stored digitally. It is arguable how well it captures that notion of trust, or whether any technology can ever actually replicate what a human being thinks, feels and acts like when they trust and are trusted.
These concepts are deeply human, as are the power structures within which digital solutions are built. Blockchain is often discussed as removing intermediaries or creating democratic solutions to problems, but it may merely replace existing analogue power structures with digital ones, and cause decision-making within such contexts to become more brutally binary. Xinhua Weibo.
Sina Weibo. Tencent Weibo. Sohu Weibo. NetEase Weibo. Related News. Foreign volunteers offer help to passengers during chunyun in Hangzhou. Chinese scientists carry out field research on King George Island.
People perform fire dragon dance to greet upcoming Spring Festival. Colored lanterns displayed during lantern show in Zigong City. Migrant birds seen in Hebei Dongwushi reservoir. Tens of thousands march against Trump in San Francisco. In this case, the refugees did not need to share any sensitive data with banks or mobile operators, benefiting from greater security and privacy through an immutable, secure blockchain.
Now, the World Food Programme is currently expanding its Ethereum-based blockchain after saving millions of dollars in bank transfers by utilizing decentralised blockchain technology. Currently, the WFP feeds over million people across 80 countries. This organ of the UN is dedicated to gender equity and the empowerment of women and was established to accelerate progress of meeting their needs worldwide.
The Blockchain simulation lab addressed humanitarian scenarios around identity. According to Jordan Daniell , Blockchain could provide a platform where storing identification documents as a viable way of proving their identity, in a humanitarian scenario.
Daniell believes that authorities could also identity women or girls who have been trafficked or who have gone missing. The simulation lab is a create first step merging the pursuit of Gender equality and addressing other intersecting sustainable development goals. The winners of this hackathon was Olivier Mukuta and his team. This gives them absolute control over their own money, independent of any male members in their family.
It provides public, private, and non-governmental organisations with the knowledge and tools that enable human progress, economic development, and nature conservation to take place together. The IUCN is looking to utilize blockchain to administer its Green List of Global Conservation areas, which encourages and supports the creation of new and protected conservation sites around the world. Blockchain offers a reduction of bank fees, more transparency about Green List funding, and progress towards meeting its goals.
This way, the IUCN can guarantee that donor funds go straight to the site they want to help. Blockchain is also said to possible improve the system of carbon asset transactions. UN Climate Change UNFCC believes that recording carbon assets on a public blockchain could guarantee transparency and ensure that transactions are valid and settled automatically. All of these entities seek to use blockchain technology to give refugees a digital identity.
They have currently teamed up with Accenture and are looking at rolling out an inter-operable, user-owned and controlled digital identity to its hundreds of thousands of staff. They hope that this initiative will evolve to a standard background check which can be distributed to potential clients using a biometrics system that can manage data on fingerprints and irises.
Blockchains enable trust which would, in turn, help mitigate corruption. Current international and domestic governance models are wrought with bureaucracy, red tape, and inefficiencies, which hinders access to these key governance structures.
Blockchain strengthens trust, and promotes information sharing between institutions and the public.