Inside UNICEF's Crypto Playbook: Stablecoin DeFi Yield for Giga, Cash Transfers by SMS

Five years ago, Launchnodes and UNICEF's Office of Innovation started a conversation that most people in crypto and most people in philanthropy would have written off. What if you could fund a UN initiative without ever giving up your principal? What if the money stayed in your wallet, and only the yield went to work?

In episode 2 of Philanthropy 3.0, Jaydeep Korde (Launchnodes) and James Newell (GSR Foundation) sit down with Gerben Kijne, Product Manager at the UNICEF Office of Innovation, to trace exactly how that idea became working infrastructure. 

Gerben runs through the Venture Fund's crypto arm, a humanitarian cash transfer pilot in Kenya that dispersed USDC to beneficiaries using phones and bare SIM cards, and the slow, unglamorous work of getting an organization the size of UNICEF to hold stablecoins on its balance sheet for the first time.

The conversation gets into the parts most crypto-for-good content skips. 

• Where does the yield actually come from, and how do you explain that to a government? 
• Which regions are leading on adoption, and which are still a wall? 
• What does "good" look like twelve months from now for Lido Impact Staking, Stablecoin for Impact, and Giga's mission to connect every school on earth to the internet?

Whether you're building in DeFi, allocating capital from a DAO treasury, running a foundation, or just trying to understand what crypto philanthropy looks like when it actually works, this is a must watch.

Donate your yield to Giga: https://stake.giga.global/
Lido Impact Staking and Stablecoin for Impact: https://impactstake.com/
Launchnodes: https://www.launchnodes.com/
GSR Foundation: https://www.gsrfoundation.io/
Giga Global: https://giga.global/

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:17

Today is episode two of Philanthropy three point zero, and we are lucky enough to have um a great guest on today's podcast, and we set up this podcast to talk about philanthropy three point zero, which for us is looking at the mechanisms inside of crypto that can support charitable organizations, multilaterals, and anyone trying to fund social impact. There are a lot of people in this space, and what we're focused on is specifically the idea of breaking the grant donor structure whereby someone has to uh apply for money or funding to do their social impact, and once that money's gone, then they have to uh reapply. And so what philanthropy 3.0 is about is exploring about these mechanisms that exist in crypto that can specifically break that mechanism. And in episode one, we talked about Lido impact staking and how it uses ETH staking returns to fund social impact and stablecoin for impact, uh, which uses Ave lending yield to fund social impact. Um we have been uh working with lots of amazing organizations, UNICEF um being one of them, and GSR Foundation being one of them, which is where my uh co-host um is is from, James. Um and without further ado, I'm gonna hand over to James. Um and um James, if there's anything I've missed about um your own uh organization or magnificence, then please fill me in before we uh we talk to our guest.

SPEAKER_02 2:05

Thank you, JD. Always very happy to talk about Magnificence. Uh so I'm from GSR Foundation, which is a grant maker established by GSR, which uh most people know as a market maker and one of the OGs of the crypto world. We've been around about 12, 13 years, and we position ourselves as crypto's capital markets partner. So the firm has uh support across the whole crypto ecosystem and has for a very long time. So we've survived a lot of ups and a lot of downs. Um and part of the ethos of the firm is to invest in exactly what JDP described. It's about uh philanthropy and understanding how this technology can be used to make money, but also how it can be used to right the many wrongs uh in the world, and it won't have escaped anyone's notice that funding is incredibly challenging to find. Uh, there's all sorts of global events that make um the double-edged sword of uh funds diminishing and social need rising uh perennial across the globe. And so working with people like JDP and his team is important for the GSR Foundation to explore and understand which paradigms uh in crypto are worth exploring and investing in. It's been a really busy week in crypto philanthropy. A couple of um shout outs, uh the crypto altruists group have just launched their Web3 Impact Toolkit, uh, which I can share a link to. But for any charity looking uh to get involved or or understand this space better, it was an initiative we sponsored to help them understand. So if you hear JDeep and I talk, or we hear Herban talk, uh and there are some terms that perhaps are less familiar to you, uh, we've built something that will enable uh everyone in the nonprofit sector to explore and understand uh what we think is very exciting new technology. So without further ado, I'm thrilled, and I know JDEP is thrilled, to be joined by a mutual long-term collaborator uh of ours, Herban. Um, Herban from the the the the US Office uh sorry, UNICEF Office of Innovation. Um we'll jump straight into questioning if you don't mind. What I'll ask you to do is ask a bit of a two-parter to kick off. If you wouldn't mind introducing yourself, and also just to contextualize that, give us a bit of an understanding uh or give the listeners a bit of an understanding about what the Office of Innovation does day to day and specifically within a UN agency. How do you understand the term frontier technology?

SPEAKER_00 4:32

Right. Uh thanks, James, and thanks, JDP, for for having me uh having me today. It's uh it's it's super nice to be able to contribute to uh to to to this podcast. Um my name is Gerban. I work with the uh UNICEF Office of Innovation. I've worked with uh uh with this uh organization for the last uh four years or so. Um and the Global Office of Innovation of UNICEF essentially um serves the uh country offices of UNICEF. Um people there there's a sort of common misconception about UNICEF that it's this like global organization that has a very sort of top-down approach where things get decided in headquarters and then pushed down to the different countries. And actually, the organization works the other way around. So the country offices actually decide what happens. Um so they work in collaboration with the governments uh in the countries that they that they work in, uh, and are there to serve the needs, uh, the needs of the children in that country. So they um they essentially say what's what say what's needed. So they they they come up with uh uh with with the ask of what's required. And then the UNICEF Office of Innovation is there to sort of serve uh serve those. So our team uh has a role. Um we have a few different things that uh uh three different activities that we do. Uh one is uh a venture fund uh in which we invest in uh in startups uh in the global south. Um so we invest up to 100,000 uh uh US dollars in equity-free um uh equity-free uh grant, essentially. Uh and the only requirement is that people open source their uh their their software. And ultimately we're hoping to build digital public goods that can serve uh that can serve uh anybody. Um and uh within that venture fund we also have a crypto fund. Uh so this is uh a fund that specifically pays in uh currently ether and uh and bitcoin. And um we've recent we've we've very very recently uh been approved also for uh stablecoin uh for the first time. So we now are also able to hold uh USDC uh and and and distributing USDC. So we're currently exploring what can be done with this new uh with this new uh um this this new rules that we have. And then the last thing that we do is um like around innovative fundraising and exploring new technologies like blockchain, like AI, like those kinds of things, uh to run pilots that uh that test things out. And our main objective is to learn from these pilots. So there's no such thing as like a failed pilot. Uh the only failure can be that we you know don't learn from it and don't don't don't implement something. Um uh and then the ultimate goal is to to implement these things and scale them up through our country officers. So that's essentially that's essentially how we work at the Office of Innovation.

SPEAKER_02 7:26

Awesome, thank you so much. Yes, that's something we work on, and I have to declare an interest because the GSR Foundation is is an enthusiastic supporter of of UNICEF and has been for some time. Um for people listening, I'm sure they'd be really interested to hear uh a little bit about your professional background and and how you come to be in this position.

SPEAKER_00 7:45

Right, yes, so my professional background uh comes from products. So I work in uh uh I studied product uh design engineering um and very quickly discovered that uh uh I enjoy digital products much more than physical products. Um so got to working in uh all kinds of ways that new technology can be improved for uh for the benefit of humanity. So I worked for um uh an organization that looked at uh how can we uh uh use applied gaming to make cities more sustainable, uh, and and a couple other projects like that. Um and um an organization like UNICEF for me always had uh a big a big appeal. Uh it's it's obviously a huge, a huge organization with a huge impact. Uh and the ability to influence the the lives of millions is really uh uh really something that uh that is important for a lot of people working on our team, uh including myself.

SPEAKER_02 8:47

Awesome, thank you. And and from that position, so so from where you sit in UNICEF, which you know obviously there are challenges in working in an organization that big, but that that there's also a real breadth um of a lens that you get on the situation in the world right now and and and everything that's going on. Uh, in your opinion, and and sort of based on the work you're doing, what do you think requires the most urgent attention and where are there critical gaps that the innovation you're building in and around crypto can help to solve?

SPEAKER_00 9:16

Yeah. So my my team and sort of the the team that I'm part of, we focus specifically on blockchain solutions. So my my lens is obviously limited by by that expertise a bit and and certainly biased. Um, but there are a few sort of really big opportunities that we're seeing. One that we're currently pursuing is around uh humanitarian cash transfers. So um we assisted uh a few of our venture fund alumni in carrying out a pilot uh around Christmas time last year in Kenya, uh which uh dispersed uh um uh USDC to beneficiaries who had very sort of limited digital literacy. Um so this was a collaboration with a few of our uh of our alumni. Uh and the learnings from that were like super interesting. Um uh for starters. So we we had um uh one of our one of our uh alumni had had built a sort of dumb phone wallet you could essentially send like SMS commands uh to to uh to move funds around. Um but we had some of our beneficiaries show up you know without without not without a smartphone, like without any phone at all, and just with a sim card, basically. So we had to we had to work work around sort of those those kinds of limitations, and it really shows the the completely different sort of landscape from what we're what we're expecting uh sort of sitting in you know offices in the West. So um that was certainly super interesting. So uh this is something that we're we're looking to explore. The the this this pilot was a great success. Um the the reduction in cost was was massive, and just the efficiency in how fast this all got done uh was just incredible. And it and it just goes to show the technology, you know, the the we the the ability to send peer-to-peer funds anywhere in the world, uh, regardless of whether financial systems are functional in the country, regardless of uh uh how literate people are in terms of digital technology, it's incredibly powerful. Uh, you know, so this this kind of like got done uh you know over a weekend uh uh ultimately. Um and and doing this through like any sort of like traditional reels would have taken would have taken forever. Uh so we're we're looking to scale this up and we're looking at at uh a few sort of potential countries to uh um to try this at a bigger scale. But there's a there's a huge amount, there's a huge amount of benefit in in this uh yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:54

Yeah, and and obviously the beauty of blockchain means that you can retrofit and adapt solutions like that if you need to build a privacy layer on top for conflict zones or or anything. And so, you know, as someone who in in past careers has had to bring suitcases of cash over slightly peculiar borders, um fully, fully appreciate. And I'm sure you know that that that's a very resonant use case. So thank you so much for that. Uh Jade, over to you.

SPEAKER_01 12:22

Thanks, Herbin. Um, it it's it's been I think five years since we've been working together, Herban, and one of the things in that remit has been very much about the Giga project and Giga's goal to try and connect every school to the internet. And the outcome and culmination of that now is your use of um both Lido impact staking and stablecoin um for impact. And if I can just um quickly briefly share my uh screen, then uh I can um show what that looks like. And here we have um the simple uh interface that allows you to keep custody of your Ethereum, stake it and donate a percentage of that to fund school connectivity um with UNIF and Giga. And then similarly, um moving to stable coins to use Ave lending yield and to point a percentage of that yield um to to to UNIF and Giga's mission to connect every school on the internet. You know, it looks, I think, um relatively straightforward. But to get here, to get anywhere close to here, could you tell us about what it takes for an organization as global, um, as complex with its own sort of I mean it's called a multilateral, and perhaps you can explain that word for those who don't know, to be able to use uh these frontier technologies and the different cross-functional bits of a global organization that needed to be brought in to make this real.

SPEAKER_00 14:11

Yeah. Yeah, I mean it's certainly been a long road. I can't believe it's been five years already. That's uh that's pretty crazy. Um, but um, yeah, it's so it's it's it's it's been a it's been a challenging road, and it's been uh really cool to see this project uh come to life in this way. Um I think that one of the challenges is that uh an organization like UNICEF, like I like I sort of like explained earlier as well, is we're we're not like uh we're not a monolith, so there's like different parts that all work together. Um one of one of them, for example, is that uh we have something that we call national committees, um, and they basically do the marketing for UNICEF. So if you live in the US in the US or you live in Sweden like I do, uh there will be a national committee that does fundraising on behalf of Giga to Giga or sorry, on behalf of Giga and on behalf of the UNICEF organization. So getting them to do anything new uh always means that they need to deprioritize like a campaign or a marketing strategy that's been working for them. So that's that's always been uh a challenging ask. So we're currently still in the stage of you know trying to prove that you know uh donors really do appreciate more transparency and that they're willing to sort of pay for that. So that's that's something that uh that we're that we're still in the in the in the process of proving right now. Um and then yeah, uh along with that also comes all of the questions about custody and uh mandates of being able to hold certain cryptocurrency, where do they get deposited, who has the keys, all that sort of thing. So it's been uh it's it's been a real challenge. Um and in terms of Giga, I think the the opportunity is is quite unique in the sense that what Giga offers is essentially something that can be traced digitally, you know, whether schools connected or not, is something that is visible online uh and something that can be traced online also through through our map. So that makes that makes this uh this possibility of like transparent funding uh something that's that's that's even more attractive. So that's that's where I see a a a good opportunity.

SPEAKER_01 16:30

Before I hand back to James, I wanted to to follow up with two questions based on what you've said. So I think in in terms of that big um sort of cross-functional organization, and you know, it's not a monolith, there are different sort of parts that move faster. Um just in terms of your view on this model of not giving away your capital, but giving away this yield that's coming from these sort of crypto primitives of staking Ethereum, um over-collateralized lending and stable coins in Rave. What uh what what's the view on it compared to traditional um you know grant funding of people sending you big checks and big institutions and corporations and governments, you know, writing writing checks? Like what's the you know, in some ways, if the existing model's working, why why look at this new model?

SPEAKER_00 17:26

Right. Well, I think I think what's really valuable in this new model is it's really attractive to I think a retail market, and the retail market isn't currently served super well by the existing model of UNICEF. If you you know, if you're a wealthy individual or an institution and you want to donate a million dollars to UNICEF, uh a lot of things are possible, and uh you can get uh uh you can get a lot of credit for for for doing that. Um but if you're an individual who cares about this mission, uh it's not it's not as straightforward. Uh you can you can donate you know anonymously in a box in an airport or something like that. Um but being able to get some transparency back for it, I think, is a completely new value proposition. Uh that uh uh that will be, I think, the way of the future. Uh so I think I think people of a new generation will be demanding this kind of like transparency uh going forward. So um yeah, so so I think it opens a new it opens a new market essentially.

SPEAKER_01 18:33

Okay, and then before before I you know hand hand back to James, on the we've been on calls with with different uh governments in um different places trying to explain you know Lido impact staking and one of the consistent themes that comes up is where is the money coming from? Where is the money coming from? What where are you getting this money from, this magic yield from that isn't like buying a uh uh an Amazon stock and hoping it goes up and you know being operational income. Five years, you know, with with with with myself telling this story, what are your reflections on that about trying to explain that that concept of like where is the money coming from?

SPEAKER_00 19:20

Yeah, it's it's uh it's a never end it's a never-ending battle, right? It's a never-ending battle. Like people, people really like I mean blockchain and crypto have like a big PR problem, you know. People a lot of people, especially you know, traditional people in government have traditional views, and um and it's um and crypto hasn't helped itself. Crypto hasn't helped itself, helped itself, exactly. So I think for for our team, the lesson has been also in um of avoiding you know words that might shut a conversation down, like you know, talk about digital assets as opposed to talking about crypto, uh, for example, things things like th things things things like that like that can help. And when it comes to sort of like the source of this like magic internet money, I mean the best example that I've been able to give so far is you know it's interest on a savings account, uh, but it's not entirely accurate, you know. So uh it's it's it's it's a bit more than that. But that's that's something that people tend to like understand. Um you get some money for having money, and that's that's kind of it.

SPEAKER_01 20:36

Yeah. Yeah, no, no, I it's I'm just yeah you you mentioned um and I I I've thought about uh uh five years on the road trying to build this concept, explain it, and and and and talk to people who rightly have every interest in protecting citizens and their financial thanks so much.

SPEAKER_02 21:00

Um and and super interesting. On on my first day in crypto, someone once told me that a crypto year is like a dog year. Um, and and so that sort of five years you've been working together probably is more like 35 years in in the schema things. So this that probably makes this one of the longest standing uh crypto for good partnerships. Uh just building on what you were talking about there, I I think your point around um crypto having a PR problem and and you know is is is accurate. Uh and and I'm conscious that when we're building out the GSR foundation, that we're not positioning ourselves to reputation launder or make crypto look good. This is about um the rails, this is about the technology. And and and one thing, um when there's a lot of red on the board and and the price action is disappointing and and there's negative press, uh for me the technology remains the same. And and you know, the the the underlying tech that enables people to get money quicker, faster, safer, more reliably. Um That's the bit that really really inspires me and encourages me. In terms, and and I I've heard I've spoken to a few people across UNICEF, and I'm always interested in the answer to this question. But in terms of how you took this asset class, so how you took impact staking as a fundraising mechanism, but also crypto as a more broad asset class, and actually drove it from, I would imagine, skepticism to broad adoption and even sort of you know the latest success around sort of stable coins and integrating stable coins into your fundraising portfolio. I wonder how you broker conversations in an organization like the UN, UDSF, um to uh improve and and um increase adoption of this technology and with something like impact staking specifically, what kind of narrative and arguments do you use to to encourage your colleagues to view it as credible?

SPEAKER_00 22:59

That's a good question. I mean, I think it really starts with disproving a lot of preconceived notions that people might have. Uh, you know, when people arrive at conversations like that, they they have their own ideas about what crypto what crypto is, and some people can't be convinced that it's not a scam, you know. Uh so that's that's kind of like where it starts. Um, then another thing that always really helps uh in what I've seen is um adoption by others. It's uh there's this like Dutch saying when like when one sheep goes over the dam, then the rest will follow. Uh and I think it sort of like applies applies to this situation. So if uh an organization like UNICEF sees other organizations doing similar things, or governments see other governments do similar things, it can it can open open the door, uh open a lot of doors. Um because there is certainly like a lot of opportunity in this space, and and people will see that if they see other people take take take advantage of those opportunities. So I think those are the biggest um the biggest sort of levers that uh that that we all have for for for more adoption. Um and I think a third lever that's currently developing is you know the the new sort of geopolitical like landscape around philanthropy, because a lot of organizations are are having to sort of redefine themselves and reprioritize themselves. Uh so uh this also brings a lot of urgency to this to this question. Uh and it gives a it opens a window of opportunity for a new way to restructure uh how how we want to uh deliver impact ultimately.

SPEAKER_02 24:43

Yeah, I I I think that's so important. I mean, you know, the the the situation we find ourselves in now really forces people to innovate and and look at new mechanisms of doing things because uh you know it's never been easy. Uh again, one of the other one of the other things someone said to me when I started in crypto is uh you know you're gonna have to get used to volatility, but I'm from a charity sector background, so so volatility doesn't scare me. I'm I'm I'm used to to funds being there one day and and not being there uh the next. In terms of uh how you integrated uh impact staking into your sort of fundraising mix, what what did that process look like? Is that something that's handled by a team internally or or is there an individual lead? How does it actually sit within your department?

SPEAKER_00 25:30

Um it's currently sort of wired into the existing infrastructure of the organization. So there's a um uh we we collaborate with the um the the Swiss Netcom, for example, for uh for handling that inflow of funds. Um and we're very grateful to them for for be willing to to to experiment essentially with this because for them it's also uh it takes away from priority like other priorities that they have. Um and it's currently, as I sort of also said earlier, it's it's in the stages of um like needing to needing to prove itself. Uh so we have a lot of faith in this, um, but it's currently not sort of attracting numbers yet that uh that will get like an organization to shift or get like uh a massive shift within the organization. So I think it's important that we all sort of continue working towards that and and continue advocating for um for this new way of fundraising. And maybe that's also a a question to ask um you know any listeners or any people uh sort of uh uh attending this. What's what what would be sort of important things that you would want to see from a more transparent way of fundraising? Uh what kind of impact would you want to see? What kind of proof of that would you want to see? Um because I think if we can sort of uh create product fit between between those those two those two sides of the market, I think there's a lot of potential in this.

SPEAKER_02 27:06

Yeah, uh absolutely. And and building on that question, it i if anyone wants to see what it looks like from a donor's point of view, or obviously the GSR Foundation has got funds staked uh to towards uh Unicef, towards other actors. Uh so if anyone wants to see that and and talk through that process, obviously very happy to have that conversation too. But but for me, it's an easier sell because my board are all from a crypto firm and and get this pretty much straight away. So it was it wasn't difficult. Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_01 27:40

Thanks, James. Urban, I wanted to pick up on that idea of um geopolitics or at least the geo bit in terms of geography. Where do you see these mechanisms being adopted more easily geographically? As UNICEF is a is a you know big international organization that works everywhere. You mentioned Swiss NATCOM. Is there anywhere else where you see there's a there's an appetite to exp a more you know a stronger appetite to experiment? And then conversely, are there any places where you think it's actually just very, very difficult geographically? That is um you can stay at the continent level if mentioning individual countries is difficult because I appreciate you're a sort of pseudo-techno diplomat.

SPEAKER_00 28:31

So yeah, yeah, no, I mean I won't name and shame anybody, obviously, but uh no, I I think I mean I think one thing that's I think challenging with this is um uh the fact that you know the crypto and web 3 space is is is a global it's a global phenomenon. So it honestly you know if you're online it doesn't matter where where you're where you're from. Um and I think that um that has some friction with the way that like other uh other sort of financial funnels are set up within the organization. Um so we're not we're not really bound by by any country uh in that sense. Um yeah, and and and I think in terms of so I think in terms of fundraising, I mean obviously the US is a big market for this uh uh for this globally. Um we also see a lot of adoption in like Latin America. Uh and I mean Africa is is a real front runner in terms of uh in terms of uh adoption. There's a lot of countries that have their own version of like a stablecoin or or uh a CBDC or something something similar. So um yeah, so when we when we look, for example, at a project like uh humanitarian cash transfers, it's not it's not super difficult to convince people to create a wallet and to and to use and to use crypto and to receive crypto. Uh because it's just a a need that they have. So uh and something they're already familiar with. Um so I think in in a sense it's it's really the the Western countries uh lagging in terms of adoption because you know there's functional financial systems there, uh so there's really no hard need for crypto.

SPEAKER_01 30:25

Sure. And going back to the specific use case of connecting schools, and I think the shout out you made to the audience around you know what impact data do you want to see as individual donors or as corporate CSR functions that would you know pique your interest in using this? I think I think that's that's something we really need to do because I think that from our perspective and and running this podcast in the past you know half a decade's work we've done with you and and and and other uh multilateral organizations as well as others, is to set a foundation that allows us to be like, come and experiment. And one of the things that we've learned through uh uh uh work with James and the GSR Foundation is trying to frame that in the right context of start with a$50,000,$100,000 um pilot as a corporate CSR function, understand the reporting, understand the impact data. Um, and I think one of the things I would be be interested in getting your view on, because James and I actually come from sort of slightly different schools of thought, where I believe the impact data is like really important in motivating continued supply of stable coins or staking returns in this mechanism. James's point is that the data clearly indicates that the people who give that addressable market is kind of fixed. And I think where we're both interested in in learning and understanding is that by saying, well, you don't have to give your money away anymore now, you're just giving away this yield, you don't hand it over, there's no annuity structure, it's much more simple and and and you don't keep it. Is there a change in that? And are you now increasing the potential um uh uh addressable market? I mean I've I've covered a lot there, and the the I suppose the question um it is what's what's your take on that? Do you think that's that's that's true? The impact data that comes from schools being so compelling and so tangible?

SPEAKER_00 32:26

So the the the the question is do I think that impact data will be critical in driving uh driving more donations? Yes. Right. Uh I mean for me, absolutely, um I think uh I think it's it's the the the more transparent we can be, I think the the the the the the better it is. There there's been you know plenty of criticism on organizations like the like the UN uh on not being transparent enough. Um and there is plenty of organizations like smaller organizations that provide a lot more transparency in sort of how they operate. So I don't see I don't see a reason why we can't be honest and transparent about the impact that's being delivered. Uh I think there are numerous challenges though when it comes to measuring and reporting uh impact. So when you talk about measuring and reporting impact, are you talking about measuring like outcomes? Are you talking about measuring actions that happen? Uh and if so, how is that being reported? Is that being self-reported or are there like third-party auditors that that that audit that sort of thing? I mean, obviously you you want to have you know independent independent auditing for uh for for for those kinds of metrics. So I think I think when you know when the rubber hits the ground, I think uh there's a lot of devil in the details when it comes to this. But for me, there is no there's no doubt that if we are able to provide honest transparency that um uh that that will ultimately be uh be a a winning value proposition uh in in this sort of space.

SPEAKER_01 34:16

And one thing that's great, and that really exciting final shout out because it is a map matter of public record. Oh, sorry. No, no, go go ahead. Go ahead. No, I was just gonna say that I wanted to make a definite shout out to Rwanda um whose government were were pioneering in adopting impact staking as a concept in a solo staking construct, um, and um for ISPs in in Rwanda who also um supported us in that. So uh thank you to uh the government of Rwanda there.

SPEAKER_00 34:50

Exactly. That that that was such a cool project that uh we actually made that happen. That was uh that was super cool. Yes. Um yeah.

SPEAKER_01 34:57

Sorry, James, I know you have um some final questions and then um we will um we will look to take some questions from the audience.

SPEAKER_02 35:07

Thanks so much. Yeah, I I just have um one very quick final one. So obviously, you know, your your point around uh proving this tech and proving this as a mechanism obviously is well received. Uh in terms of how uh UNICEF uh is supporting uh other agencies. So I I know the UN uh HCR, I know UNDP have got uh some skin in the the crypto game. But I wonder if you could talk a little bit about sort of what UNICEF is doing to drive adoption, both more broadly, so so to encourage more sheep to go over the uh the the dam, was it? Uh and and also with within the within the the UN ecosystem, what type of actions are you doing to champion and and what response is it getting?

SPEAKER_00 35:56

So I am not personally super closely connected with this, but I do know that there are uh initiatives to to bridge the the different UN systems and to to to bridge the different sort of uh blockchain projects going on. One thing that um we always do as a as a team is like I said, in the pilots that we run, the most important thing is that we learn from them, and one thing we always do is we publish those learnings. So part of our sort of uh open source sort of identity uh is that we are also transparent about those kinds of things. And for and for us, you know, blockchain has been really powerful and useful in that. Like, for example, in this humanitarian cash transfer project that we did, uh we published uh uh a public dashboard uh on on June that shows exactly where these funds come from, when they were transferred, when they were received, when they were off-ramp to MPSA. Um and that kind of like transparency. I mean, I I wouldn't want to go into SAP to try to like retrieve data like that and and and make it transparent. And then who who would believe you uh as well? You know, you could just make those those kinds of numbers up. So um, so that's that's our that's our take. And I I know a lot of other UN agencies follow similar uh sort of creeds, like they they try to publish their learnings. Um yeah.

SPEAKER_02 37:21

Perfect, thank you. Well, I'll hand over to JD for the last word before we throw open some questions.

SPEAKER_01 37:26

Just what does good look like 12 months from now? I think I know the answer to this is gonna be sorry. Well, what is what what does good look like in terms of the use UNICEF's um venture fund Giga's use of stablecoin for impact and and Lido impact staking in 12 months' time? What does good look like? What you know, what from from your perspective, what finds good going forward in the next 12 months?

SPEAKER_00 37:49

What does good look like? Um, so for me, it would be um product market fit. Uh, if we can prove product market fit, uh I I still see Liz as you know this like two sided two-sided marketplace where the value proposition is super clear for me, but somehow uh people find it difficult or complex to wrap their heads around or um not compelling enough. Maybe we're maybe we need to provide more uh impact evidence, or I'm I'm not sure. But uh so for me, if we if we have product market fits, I think that would that would that would be amazing. Uh because I I think like once once we have that, the the scaling will uh will go by itself. Like, I mean it's a it's a global market and there's such huge amounts of potential uh in this. Uh so that that's what good would look like. And in terms of um uh crypto within the UN in general, uh I would really like to see uh more collaboration between these UN agencies. Um I would also uh really like to see more adoption in terms of uh uh stable coins. I think stable coins really provide an opportunity, uh, and people are sort of getting the message now for this. So um yeah, I I I I I think there there's a there's so much sort of funds moving around in the in in the UN system trying to fund all these impactful projects. Uh, if we can do those on blockchain reels, I think it would save a ton of money and uh uh would go a long way into providing more impact.

SPEAKER_01 39:32

Thank you for that uh clear and concise uh summary. Let's um let's try and open it up some questions, I think. Um do we have any questions in the chat? Um there's some discussions about stable coins um and the idea that some countries are banning stable coins. Um Herman, do you have a view on that? Um and is that um is that something you could talk to? Whether countries are planning stable coins, like their own stable coins, banning, banning them, stopping them, making them specifically banning them.

SPEAKER_00 40:14

Um I mean, yeah, there there's all there's always that question um of legality. Um I mean so currently the the UN and the UN operates in you know US dollars everywhere around the world. Um so there are still currently ways ways to get around that. And I mean we obviously serve the the the governments in the countries that we operate in, so we can't you know we can't evade any uh any sort of wishes that they have in terms of how their financial system operates. Um so but I think it's a matter of time until until countries come around come around to this. Um and maybe what it takes is countries having their own having their own stable coins or or or central bank digital currencies to uh uh to feed into the system. But I think it's inevitable that the financial reels are going in this direction. Um I attended uh uh this like uh Stockholm fintech week event the other day, and the general consensus was really that like you know the the the new Rails is is uh is blockchain. So um yeah, it seems pretty clear.

SPEAKER_01 41:32

It's good to know. Um the other question that we had, which is around have you ever thought about a Dune dashboard to manage transparency requests? Um in terms of a visualization, uh for those who don't know, um a Dune dashboard allows sort of real-time visualization of blockchain activity. Um Herbin, you're nodding, so I'll let you take that one.

SPEAKER_00 41:55

Yeah, no, absolutely. So for the humanitarian cash transfer project, we uh we we did build one. Uh I'll see uh after the call if I can like dig up uh dig it up and and maybe we can share it somewhere. Um yeah, but yeah, that's that's definitely something that we're super interested in.

SPEAKER_01 42:10

Amazing. Um and then we have another one which is um what is the legal architecture today for routing DeFi yield into a UN-linked entity across jurisdictions?

SPEAKER_00 42:23

Um so we collaborate with our existing uh our existing um sort of financial infrastructure, which is the national committees. Uh so they are currently the way for funds to go into uh uh into the organization. So we we collaborated with uh the the Swiss NEFCOM in the in this case.

SPEAKER_01 42:48

And just to add to that, um an answer to that question is that the legal flows and the jurisdictions from which your uh organization is essentially using looking to use this mechanism is something that the GSR Foundation have obviously um looked to explore and have other um INGOs and multilaterals who are using um Lido Impact Staking and Stablecoin for Impact. If you would like to understand more about that in detail, talk to the GSR team about that, they would be happy to um explain the the paperwork thinking and exact structures around some of that um that that make it real and have allowed them to embrace it because it's it's actually a great question and and really important. Um the next question is Is there a standard uh standardized SPV, which is special purpose vehicle stroke treasury structure being considered for institutionalizing SFI across multiple projects like Giga? Um my first answer to that is yes, we'll we're as in we're open to all ideas. We've we've just started, but yes, these sorts of ideas and conversations are are are are seeming to be coming thick and fast, yeah. I I I won't want to talk exp specifically for Giga though. I apologize, that's more broadly um Herman if you want to talk to to to UNICEF or Giga.

SPEAKER_00 44:16

I mean from from our side, I mean we we we have to work with the uh kind of like organizational structure that we have. So it's always a bit of a sort of workaround in trying to plug crypto systems into like existing systems. But yeah it it's it's not like super problematic.

SPEAKER_01 44:35

Got it. And then another uh question we have uh is have Giga got any plans or are there other projects I suppose in the UNE case system that are looking at agriculture connectivity in any agricultural context? So Giga is not currently actively looking into agriculture but I mean as I can um deduct from the technologies as in people people in rural areas um that depend on agriculture okay so so still still schools I mean yeah I mean I think I think that that goes without saying I think the the place where giga is most relevant is in the most uh sort of remote remote areas uh most of the you know populated areas they receive uh connectivity nowadays even um even in you know uh less well off countries but it's the remote areas that really get left behind uh so the the difference between somebody growing up in uh Kigali versus uh the the the countryside can be can be pretty huge yeah and then just to just to expand on that herbin do the idea of a school being connected to the internet obviously providing an educational benefit to the students that connectivity provides a much broader economic and societal benefit is that is that correct is that the giga hypothesis and evidenced by the the work you've done so far I mean for for sure the the the benefits are the benefits are are are massive we we've seen you know for example uh cost and effort in terms of administration go down a lot uh uh there used to be cases where you know people had to uh walk for day to uh to hand in uh uh to to to to to like mark papers and to sort of uh report back to the government what uh what attendance uh uh what attendance numbers are like and things like that and now they can do these kinds of administration um uh from uh from the office itself so uh from from from the school itself so yeah the the benefits are massive so I think without further ado um I'm just gonna check that there aren't any other answered questions um I wanted to say on behalf of um our team um and I'm sure James as well um thank you uh for the for the work you do um in connecting schools um and more broadly at UNICEF uh venture fund the uh the the the the grant and sort of applying for a um UNICEF um venture fund grant um herban will try and um include links to that but it'd be great to share that if there's anything uh anything immediately uh a link at hand in the chat um and we really just want to say thank you very much uh for your time and and for the past five years of of working together to bring this to life um and I think the the next challenge is to is to make it um a really powerful successful tool that that finances both school connectivity and and many other things um that that need fixing right now in a more sustainable way um and also just to remind everyone that we will be um having this uh podcast again um with um other eminent guests like urban who are using the mechanism and exploring crypto to um create sustainable funding mechanisms um and without further ado um james is there anything else we we need to cover before we say thank you very much and goodbye uh no i don't think so uh awesome engagement great questions everyone thank you so much for listening and herban yeah to to echo jd thank you so much for this contribution but also uh everything you do it's so important well thanks thanks to you both as well for uh for all the work you do uh and uh and happy fifth five year anniversary I guess JD yeah exactly thanks heaven take care everyone see you all soon