The President, Julius Maada Bio, announced the new system during the U.N. General Assembly yesterday.
According to Maada Bio, the initiative aims to substantially change local economy.
Non-profit Kiva, the U.N. Capital Development Fund (UNCDF), and the U.N. Development Programme (UNDP) are the partners of the project.
According to representatives of Kiva, Sierra Leone was chosen because there is only one credit bureau in the republic, serving about 2 thousand people, which is less than 1% of the total population. Moreover, 80% of the citizens of the republic do not have access to banking services.
In his statement, Deputy Executive Secretary of UNCDF Xavier Michon noted that the republic has sufficient potential to make a significant leap in the development of the banking model.
It is noted that the project developers plan to provide each resident of Sierra Leone with personal identification tools and a cryptocurrency wallet with credit history.
The “Kiva Protocol” is a blockchain platform which will establish an identification system for citizens.
“The Kiva Protocol will capture a wide range of financial transactions … to help people access the financial services they need, including loans for businesses, education or basic medical services”, – the company states in the announcement.
Crypto community has been recently discussing the importance of personal data. It looks like Kiva Protocol will give the citizens of Sierra Leone a chance to take control of their private information. This could create a precedent for a DLT based credit offices.
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