UNICEF unveils NFTs on Ethereum to Assist Link Schools to Internet

UNICEF is rolling out a collection of NFTs to raise funds for school internet connections. The NFT launch is the latest initiative by the UN children's agency to promote blockchain technology.

The United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF) announced Saturday the unveiling of a collection of NFTs on Ethereum to mark the 75th anniversary of the UN agency.

UNICEF states that the profits from the NFT set to launch in January 2022 will go toward promoting its various projects, including the Giga initiative to support internet access for children globally.

Established in 2019, the Giga Initiative is a worldwide project by UNICEF in partnership with the UN's International Telecommunication Union to link all schools to the internet to ensure that children can benefit from web-based opportunities and information.

The Patchwork Kingdom collection built in association with the Ethereum Foundation, NFT marketplace, Snowcrash Labs, Metagood amongst others, has 1,000 NFTs. UNICEF announced that to skillfully convey Giga's benefits, each NFT is colored using data the initiative gathered from more than 282,000 schools across 21 countries.

Bremer says that she was inspired by the work of "It's a Small World" by creator Mary Blair to start the idea of utilizing simple circles, squares, shapes, geometric shapes, and triangles to create sets and cities. She said, "In the final visuals, each school has become a tiny square, interlocking with other schools to form Kingdoms, split between those connected and disconnected to the internet."

The UN agency has been involved in blockchain technology since before its 2019 unveiling of the CryptoFund, which enables the organization to accept, hold, and supply crypto.

CryptoFund helped to raise funds. For instance, in April this year, Huobi Charity Limited, a non-profit linked to cryptocurrency exchange Huobi Global, donated $1 million in BTC and fiat to the children's agency and an extra 7 BTC to CryptoFund.

Besides, UNICEF Innovation Fund has invested in blockchain for years, supporting early-stage, open-source Web3 projects with the capacity to benefit children globally.

UNICEF uses NFTs to raise money for impoverished nations

The widespread use of the internet is frequently taken for granted in developed nations. The truth is that the Internet is still inaccessible to almost 2.9 billion individuals.

The fact that schools in developing nations are cut off from the rest of the world is a devastating issue. Their academic and social marginalization is made worse by an absence of internet access, which is exacerbated by widespread school closings.

According to data from UNICEF, the majority of those without internet access live in developing nations, and kids continue to suffer as a result of local schools' lack of internet access.

Through a partnership with the International Telecommunication Union, a UNICEF-led project is addressing this conundrum in a creative approach, which resulted in the development of Giga in 2019.

At the Blockchain Expo in Amsterdam, Giga's Project Connect effort was described by Gerben Kijne, the company's blockchain product manager. In impoverished nations all throughout the world, Giga has made progress in bringing internet access to schools.

Project Connect was used to map schools' connectivity as the initial stage in this procedure. On an open-source map, Giga utilizes machine learning to search satellite pictures and locate schools. Approximately 1.1 million schools have been located so far in 49 different countries, with connectivity information available for a third of them. The next phase in the process was developing an innovative fundraising drive that delved into the blockchain, crypto, and NFTs after discovering how many schools needed internet connection.

Then, Giga organized an NFT fundraising event to spread the word about these schools and support them in three main ways: by providing essential, affordable software and content that is localized to their respective native languages; by creating new financing programs to improve broadband access; and by working with digital banking services to improve the effectiveness and oversight of public programs that distribute payment.

Giga assisted the government of Kyrgyzstan in saving $200k annually by cutting internet costs in half (from $50/30 days to $28.5/30 days) and significantly increasing its bandwidth (from 2Mbps to 4Mbps). In order to indicate where schools had access to electricity, Giga surveyed 4,758 schools in Niger. Additionally, Giga in Rwanda gained funding from a private internet service provider, improving internet connectivity and lowering its price per Mbps for schools by 55%. (from 20USD to about 9 and 14USD per Mbps).

A collection of 1000 randomly created NFTs generated on the Ethereum blockchain were released by Giga and Dutch artist Nadieh Bremer as part of its most recent NFT-led fundraising push, the "Patchwork Kingdoms" endeavor. The NFTs, which symbolize those both with and without internet access, were created using Giga's student records.