Breaking Free the Unbanked
More than 1 Billion unbanked farmers are trapped within a vicious circle difficult to leave: their modest income and inability to access fair financing and loans hardly lets them cover anything else than subsistence needs. But worse than that, it prevents them from investing in the improvement of their productivity; and because they cannot improve productivity, income remains low.
The main tool to break free from this circle is to provide access to reasonable interest rate loans for increasing productivity to such an extent they are capable of both things: paying such debt and investing again to raise such productivity.
At EthicHub we believe providing access to affordable financing for the unbanked is not enough: it is equally important to ensure the proper use of that money;
If the loan is used to buy a television instead of investing it on improving productivity, it will become just a debt that worsens their economic situation.
To strive for the positive impact of money is part of the commitment we assumed by choosing a name like EthicHub: We are not just any P2P crowd lending platform, but also a social network in order to create value for all parties.
That’s why we consider it essential for the EthicHub Local Nodes to receive constant training. This allows them to carry out a suitable follow-up work and they can also help their communities to improve in three major areas:
- Productivity Improvement: Applying fertilizers, doing cultivation works on time and in order (cleaning, shading, trimming and pruning), planting varieties of higher yield and more pest resistant. In the long-term even installing automated irrigation and fertilization systems.
- Crop diversification: Even with a good productivity, monoculture remains exposed to the risks of market, weather and pest, which all may affect the production. Proper crop diversification may allow for a stable income level.
- Improved sale conditions: Due to the small volume and lack of market information, farmers rarely sell at the best possible prices. EthicHub will provide them with information on market prices. We will also help them accumulate good product volumes in order to optimize the sale prices. In the medium and long term we envision farmers helping each other and organize themselves to process their crops and even trade them independently. Within EthicHub’s social network there are many lovers and consumers of coffee, cocoa, tea and other valuable products. And we are convinced that the majority of them would love to help people like Gerardo (our example farmer) as well as buying his products.
EthicHub Philosophical Layer
EthicHub has a technological layer and a business layer, however we want to be recognized by our “mission and values layer”: the philosophy behind the project. EthicHub has been created from the ground up believing the new financial system must be more inclusive, fair and therefore sustainable. We strongly believe mutual benefit is the true driver of economic development.
Our mission is democratizing access to credit and best investment opportunities while humanizing the credit sector at the same time.
Our values are:
- Equal opportunity and community. A token only has value if there is a community that believes in it.
- Trust: In order to convince investors to lend their money to people at the other side of the world, everything is about building trust between borrowers and lenders.
Stronger community
As I wrote in another article, thanks to blockchain we are shifting from capital based economics to community based economics.
We believe if we remain committed and we act aligned to our philosophical layer, the community will be stronger, turning then into a real competitive advantage.
In addition to the fertile soil, a layer for community building will make it easier to gather a long-term committed community around a positive impact project. Real decentralized governance will further contribute to build this community as I explained in this article.
Technology is easy to copy; business models can be imitated; but a long-term supportive community can’t be forged easily, it remains the most valuable asset for a project.
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