On Thursday, April 19th, the Belgium government announced its support by contributing €2 million worth funds in donation to the blockchain initiative by the World Food Programme (WFP). This funding will be used in order to improve the technology projects that include blockchain-based payments pilot for refugees as well bridging the gap between resource requirements and aid delivery.
Last year in May 2017, the United Nations launched an Ethereum-based payments pilot in order to improve cash transfers to Syrian refugees in Jordan. So far, more than 10000 people have received the advantage of this programme.
However, Belgium contribution in this project would be to provide more technologically enhanced blockchain solutions in addition to another unmanned ariel vehicle (UAV) that will help to collect information of any affected areas and make the damage analysis.
The Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Development Cooperation in Belgium, Alexander De Croo stated:
“Innovation saves lives. This year, more than 128 million people across the world will need humanitarian assistance and protection. This is triple the number of three years ago. Only by finding better ways to deliver aid more efficiently will we close the gap between requirements and aid delivery on the ground. Belgium lauds the efforts of WFP to come up with innovative solutions to save more lives and help more people in need.”
The food assistance branch of the United Nations claims that this project dubbed Building Blocks, “is delivering more [aid] for less, offering donors better value for money.”
Rehan Asad, WFP chief of staff said that in these testing times of growing global crisis, such innovative solutions have proved to be really helpful. “Humanitarians must relentlessly look for ways to harness the most promising digital technologies in the service of the world’s most vulnerable people,” he said. “We are grateful to committed partners such as Belgium for helping us do just that.”