SME South Africa celebrates Game changers/Disruptors this March. Follow along as we explore ideas and people that are challenging the status quo.
Rufaro Masiiwa, a modular MBA student at the UCT Graduate School of Business (GSB), has built a platform, Funds Aid, that could help solve the problem of transferring monetary aid from donors to beneficiaries.
Zimbabwean-born Masiia’s Master’s thesis was in health and development.
“Nearly a third of aid is lost to corruption and fraud. Furthermore, sending monetary transfers through traditional banking systems is associated with high transaction costs,” says Masiiwa.
The solution allows users to bypass traditional channels, instead depositing funds demarcated as aid into an escrow account of a partner bank.
In exchange, explains Masiiwa, the bank issues tokens equivalent to fiat currency, which are then disbursed to beneficiaries. The beneficiaries can use these tokens to purchase goods.
It was important to Masiiwa’s team to ensure that there was no room for aid funds to be intercepted.
Blockchain is effectively increasing transparency of transactions, reducing transaction costs and increasing access to finance for the world’s most vulnerable people
“The tokens can only be redeemed by beneficiaries, who are issued with a unique key that unlocks the tokens from their wallet, thereby eliminating the loss of funds through corruption and fraud,” Masiiwa explained.
“Only the merchant is able to redeem the tokens for fiat currency using the partner bank.”
Beyond wealth
Masiiwa says the project highlights the importance of adopting blockchain technology beyond increasing wealth, but also in creating a better world: increasing transparency in multiple areas and protecting the vulnerable.
“Blockchain is effectively increasing transparency of transactions, reducing transaction costs and increasing access to finance for the world’s most vulnerable people.
“It is a disruptive technology with the potential to positively change the lives of Africa’s financially excluded,” Masiiwa says. This is particularly pertinent because the continent is more affected by the refugee crisis than any other continent, with South Africa facing a conservative count of nearly half a million pending asylum claims.
The solution cuts across many sectors
Masiiwa was selected to participate in South Africa’s first BlockChain hackathon, Unblock the Block, hosted by Linum Labs and UCT research institute, the African Institute for Financial Markets and Risk Management (AIFMRM), earlier this year. The 10-day event was looking to surface relevant blockchain solutions with a positive application on the African continent and saw almost 80 participants from around the world attending.
She adds the major advantage is that the project concept – of transferring value – can be applied to other areas, such as remittances and traditional bank transfers, increasing security in other sectors too. “The solution cuts across many sectors.”
In 2017, it was expected that some African regions would receive around $45 billion in development aid. This is the bulk of the $75 billion the International Development Association (IDA) has budgeted to spend on financing life-saving and life-changing operations over the next three years, in 30 of the world’s poorest, most vulnerable countries.
The overall first prize for the Hackathon was split between two teams: the first winning concept was Proof of Steak by team Yuna, a platform for investing in cattle, the second was BlockPoll, a voting system to facilitate better governance in companies, as well as transparency and security in elections.
