10-13, 11:00–12:00 (America/Bogota), Talk 1
The term 'public good', which has been adopted by many in the Ethereum community, should apply to the whole public, including those without access to traditional systems. This panel is about how blockchains actually make it to the un/under-banked -- the pragmatic considerations, and the inspirational possibilities.
Panelists include Abhishek Bhattacharya, Benson Njuguna, Gabriela Guerra, and Marcus Alburez Myers with Karam Alhamad as moderator.
Fellows are leaders committed to projects that help Ethereum become a tool of and for the next billion. Some projects might be part of a lifelong quest of the Fellow; others are brand new ideas that are just getting started. Fellows and their projects focus on public goods that enable the flourishing of communities or individuals under-represented in the Ethereum ecosystem today.
Benson is an Ethereum Foundation fellow, working with ACRE Africa and Etherisc to deliver insurance to smallholder farmers in Africa. He is on a mission to elevate his local community financially, through technological innovation. He is currently working on real life application of Ethereum network to solve transparency and efficiency problems in traditional insurance. So far the project has reached over 50,000 smallholder farmers in Africa ,de-risking them from adverse weather events.
Abhishek is a Co-founder at Whrrl - India's only blockchain native fintech platform. He's a Forbes 30 under 30 honoree and a 3-times Entrepreneur, Author, and a regular Speaker of Blockchain Tech. At Whrrl, he's bringing Blockchain to farmers to save their income, covering 1,400 warehouses & 18,000+ farmers and US $300 Million in committed TVL and now connecting them to global DeFi lenders, supported by United Nations Development Programme, IIM Ahmedabad and MassC
Marcus is exploring how DeFi can be used to reduce barriers to enhanced livelihoods in disenfranchised communities in Guatemala. His research focuses on how we can leverage web3 as a tool to unlock value for communities that are systematically marginalized throughout Guatemala. Marcus is conducting with a variety of stakeholders ranging from rural communities through to leading DeFi protocols and dApps in order to uncover the missing infrastructure to enable more equitable futures for all.
Founder of Bloinx, a blockchain app that manages saving circles. She has experience managing international projects and is convinced that blockchain can benefit the unbanked population.