UNICEF Giga NFTs to connect schools in developing countries to the internet

by · September 22, 2022

Developed countries often take for granted that the Internet is ubiquitous. But the reality is that around 2.9 billion people still do not have a connection to the world wide web.

Data provided by UNICEF highlights that the majority of this internet-less mass of people live in underdeveloped countries, and children continue to be disadvantaged by the lack of internet connectivity at local schools.

A UNICEF-led initiative tackles this dilemma in a new way through a joint venture with the International Telecommunication Union that led to the creation of Giga in 2019.

Gerben Kijne, blockchain product manager at Giga, outlined the firm’s Project Connect initiative at Blockchain Expo in Amsterdam. Giga has made progress in connecting schools to the internet in developing countries around the world.

Gerben Kijne talks about Gigas Project Connect and the Patchwork Kingdoms NFT fundraising experiment at the Blockchain Expo in Amsterdam.

The first step in this process was to map schools and their connectivity through Project Connect. Giga uses machine learning to scan satellite images to identify schools on an open source map. To date, it has found over 1.1 million schools in 49 countries and connectivity data for a third of those schools.

After identifying a large number of schools in need of internet access, the next step in the process was to create a new fundraising initiative that delved into the world of blockchains, cryptocurrencies and NFTs.

Speaking to Cointelegraph after his keynote address at the RAI Convention Center in Amsterdam, Kijne unpacked Gigas’ Patchwork Kingdoms initiative. With NFTs increasing in popularity over the past couple of years, Giga looked to make the most of the craze through its own NFT-led fundraising experiment in March 2022.

Giga teamed up with Dutch artist Nadieh Bremer to launch a collection of 1,000 procedurally generated NFTs minted on the Ethereum blockchain. The NFTs were produced using Gigas’ school data to represent those with and without an internet connection.

The public NFT sale raised about 240 Ether (ETH) worth $700,000, which went directly to connecting schools to the internet. Kijne admitted that the value raised was secondary to the exploration of a different type of philanthropic fundraising.

“I think NFTs also provide a very interesting application area. One of the things we’re starting to look at is what does philanthropy look like for the next generation of people? Because if you go to UNICEF now and donate, I don’t even know what you’re getting, probably as a ‘thank you email’ or something.”

Kijne believes that NFTs can provide a closer connection to donations, highlighting their use to track the impact of donations through the ownership of a specific school’s NFT and monitor when the funds raised are “cashed in” to pay for internet connectivity .

Many lessons were learned from the NFT-based fundraising initiative. As Kijne reflected, building a community before launch may have helped increase support. As has been seen in the NFT space, community members play a role, but opportunistic NFT investors are always present, looking for a chance to profit from new launches.

“I think quite a few people who joined us, they formed one of two camps. We have the people we were targeting, Giga supporters. Many bought their first ever NFT. Then the other group is people who think, ‘Oh, a UNICEF NFT! Let me figure it out.'”

Despite this, the project was deemed a success and provides an exciting use case for blockchain-based NFTs as a means of transparent, community-building fundraising. The public sale in March 2022 sold out in three hours and raised $550,000. The additional 20 percent of funds raised came from secondary sales at OpenSea.