How do you have a proper checkers tournament when no one can pay the entry fees? Jacob the organizer saw an opportunity. His neighbors in several rural villages are in the worst time of the year because of the scarcity of Kenyan Shillings. Instead of shillings they are using their phones to exchange blockchain tokens (Community Inclusion Currencies) for basic needs. Jacob figured the many checkers (draft/draughts) players (a local tradition) who would be willing to pay an ent

With every transaction being logged anonymously on a public blockchain we have unprecedented insight into what living below the poverty line means in rural and urban Kenya. All the anonymous data from 2019 is freely available on github: with 92,223 transactions of 7,630 users. Pulling out what represents distribution and redemption of community currencies we are left with roughly 168,000 USD of trade between Sarafu users. The voucher redemption cost was a total of 12,000 USD

So far, after roughly 6 months of piloting we've witnessed 40,000 blockchain transactions! So what does that actually mean?

A few decades ago, the idea of giving money to poor people instead of food packages and healthcare was almost scandalous. Free money? With no strings attached? Surely, this was aid gone wrong – a desperate attempt to do things differently that was bound to fail. Today, the evidence for cash transfers as an effective form of aid has changed the way we think about giving money to the poor, as well as the methods we use to fight poverty. In December 2018, a number of UN agencies

Closing 2018 with a bang! We mark the end of 2018 and the beginning of this festive season by honoring schools, clinics, micro and small businesses who empowered themselves economically through Community Currency. Business people across communities in Kibera, Kangemi and Kawangware came together today to share how the use of Sarafu-Credit has impacted their lives as they joined in the merry of economic empowerment highlighting their self development. Honoring these micro busi

Blockchain based Proof of Impact for Community Currencies

We can't print enough paper notes for everyone who needs them. But nearly everyone has a phone (without internet). In order to reach a larger group of people across Kenya, Grassroots Economics has enabled feature phones with no internet, to have access to, trade and convert their blockchain-based tokens (Liquid Community Currencies (LCCs)) using the Bancor Protocol. Community currencies came about as an integrative medium of exchange that would promote revitalization of the

On October 25th Will Ruddick along with Galia Bernartzi from Bancor addressed the UN regarding the potential impacts of blockchain technolog

Caption: Mama Evelin (right) in Bangladesh, Mombasa learns to trade her Bangla-Pesa using the Bancor Wallet; taught by Ruth Ngau of Grassroots Economics (left). Thanks to Bancor, blockchain is finally becoming a tool we can use to fight poverty. Yesterday we had an amazing day in Mombasa field-testing the Bancor Wallet on POA network to enable zero-transaction fees and fast payments for local transactions. As tomatoes and chapati changed hands, local shop owners and their cus

Grassroots Economics Director, Caroline Dama, visited the White House on Wednesday as a finalist in the WomensConnect USAID program Our aim is to empower women to take charge of their economic future through the creation of community currencies. Grassroots Economics seeks to provide stable markets to Women’s groups in Kenya through women owned and operated community currency systems, which will connect thousands of female small scale business traders in rural and peri-urban a