We Stand With Refugees, Together and Always!
Let’s change a life today, on World Refugee Day.
Each year on the 20th of June, the world unites for World Refugee Day to honor the strength, courage, and perseverance of millions of refugees. The Day provides a chance to build empathy and compassion for the refugees, as well as, increase awareness of the global refugee issue and steps to protect their human rights. This year, it is more important than ever to remember the extreme challenges refugees face and give our support. As impactMarket, on World Refugee Day, we shall use this opportunity to show why it is crucial to think differently and how we lead by example by leveraging blockchain technology to find life-changing solutions for those in need.
We Have a Problem
We are living in unprecedented times, where the lingering effects of the pandemic, the war in Ukraine, and political instability around the world cause a severe humanitarian crisis. Every day, there is news about people who have been forced to flee their homes to escape war, conflict, violence, human rights violations, terror, and natural catastrophes. Analyzing the statistics, the numbers make the situation much direr. As of 2022, the globe has never seen such a high degree of human relocation.
According to UNHCR’s latest data, for the first time, more than 100 million people are forcibly displaced worldwide. This number represents 1% of the world’s population and is equivalent to the 14th most populous country.
Currently, millions of individuals are stateless, having been denied a nationality and fundamental rights such as education, healthcare, work, and freedom of movement. There are:
- 26.6 million refugees in the world — the highest ever seen and around 42 % of whom are under the age of 18
- 50.9 million internally displaced people
- 4.4 million asylum-seekers
- Focusing on one of the main humanitarian crises nowadays, in Venezuela, there are 4.1 million Venezuelans displaced abroad
Moreover, the war in Ukraine has created the fastest-growing humanitarian crisis in Europe since the end of World War II. About 14 million people have been forced to flee due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine which began in February 2022.
The tip of the Iceberg
The war in Ukraine and the media have made many aware of the conflict-related refugee crisis, though, this is the tip of the iceberg. For decades, refugees from the Syrian Arab Republic, Venezuela, Afghanistan, South Sudan, and Myanmar have fled for their lives. The increasing violence in the countries stated and the protracted conflicts in 🇪🇹 Ethiopia, 🇧🇫 Burkina Faso, 🇲🇲 Burma, 🇳🇬 Nigeria, 🇦🇫 Afghanistan, and the 🇨🇩 Democratic Republic of Congo have caused the world’s forcibly displaced population to hit an all-time high.
- Ethiopia still struggles with the brutal war that pits Tigray fighters against the Addis Ababa government.
- In Afghanistan, the Taliban has returned to power, and 4.3 million people have already been forced to leave their homes.
- In Myanmar, the military junta seized power in 2021.
- In Syria, the civil war has been raging for more than 11 years. There are 13.5 million displaced Syrians, representing more than half of Syria’s population.
Unfortunately, 1 in every 95 people in the world has fled their home as a result of conflict or persecution. In addition, natural catastrophes, droughts, and various weather occurrences are now forcing a growing number of people to evacuate their homes as the global climate crisis worsens. Known also as “climate refugees”, 23.7 million people were displaced in 2021 alone because of environmental disasters.
- China, the Philippines, and India alone accounted for over 70% of all disaster-related relocations in 2021
- Many people fled across the border into Mexico from the Central American countries of Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador, which had been devastated by severe hurricanes
- In Mozambique, Myanmar, Somalia, and South Sudan, besides decades-old protracted conflicts, overlapping natural crises threaten food security and increase the vulnerability of millions.
Behind The Numbers
Every minute, 20 people have had to leave behind their homes, lives that they know, their neighbors and families, their professions, their memories, and… everything. A person who becomes a refugee is likely to be displaced for many years. The difficulties they face as a result of their displacement make the refugees vulnerable and push them into extreme poverty. They lose their possessions and livelihoods and cannot afford their basic needs. Many people are also experiencing discrimination, sexual violence, and hardships such as lack of food, water, shelter, and medical care. Furthermore, in many cases, they cannot access education, and they are unable to find employment or affordable housing. While these have been some of the challenges they faced for the decades, 2020 has also taken a devastating toll on refugees because of COVID-19.
Due to the overcrowding of refugee communities and inadequate access to clean water and sanitary facilities, refugees have been more vulnerable to COVID-19. The pandemic has had a terrible impact on them by increasing economic insecurity while also creating challenges in accessing health and social services which are the basic minimum standards that facilitate the survival of refugees. During the coronavirus pandemic, lockdowns and mobility restrictions limited livelihood prospects, forcing thousands of refugee families into poverty and increasing their need for humanitarian help.
Despite the government-assisted and private entities’ essential support, as well as NGOs’ efforts for meeting refugees’ most basic needs, the numbers speak for themselves by hitting 100 million. This highlights once again why we need more effective, faster, transparent, borderless, and sustainable methods to support refugees, contribute to improving their lives, and empower them with a financial agency.
Being Part of the Solution
To be at the heart of the problem to find a better solution, as impactMarket, we are leveraging blockchain technology to support vulnerable refugee communities by partnering with NGOs. We are distributing Unconditional Basic Income (UBI) through our impact-driven protocol to beneficiaries staying at refugee camps and immigrant communities all over the world.
By bringing blockchain-driven UBI to underprivileged displaced people, we aim to ensure that they can meet their basic needs while also creating a chance to secure longer-term financial tools. With our protocol, we’re building a game-changing method that enables refugees to access vital funds without special training or conditions. Thanks to our partners and our crypto-based UBI program, we can distribute donations through our impactMarket app, and we are able to reach the most vulnerable in the refugee camps even those who may not have access to smartphones or the internet. In doing so, we contribute to transforming refugee camps into self-sustainable communities.
How is our protocol changing the narrative?
As in other global communities that we support, refugees can use their UBI as they prefer — meaning that they can buy food, medicine, or invest to create an income for themselves. For example, in Afghanistan, we are helping war victims, especially widows, by providing weekly $7 UBI donations and enabling these women to buy milk for babies and food for the children. Whereas in Ukraine, within the UBI for Ukraine community that we have created, we are supporting individuals to use UBI as a financial tool, as in the example of Ilya Gomola, a musician who is escaping the war dependent on his savings and the online selling of his music.
Moreover, building on the top of the Celo Blockchain, our protocol allows UBI to be fast and borderless, and we can support refugees regardless of their location or circumstances. In addition to knowing that their most basic needs will be met with UBI in a timely manner, being borderless also helps refugees to have some relief and hope about the future, as opposed to having to guess when money will come.
In Myanmar, for instance, we are running a pilot with an NGO that supports Internally Displaced People (IDPs) in the region. The manager of the program shares how impactMarket’s protocol is paving the way to prosperity:
‘‘In Myanmar that is the urgent need with the total nationwide approaching 1 million people. For some displaced communities, UBI will provide a path to income generation; for others, it will offer relief to the most needy. The beneficiaries were very thankful to receive the first UBI provision from this project because for several months, they had no financial independence”.
Furthermore, since being borderless is one of the greatest features of cryptocurrency and our protocol, refugees having blockchain-based UBI are free from the dangers on their way to withdraw the money from the bank which is crucial if they are still living in unsafe regions.
As a decentralized protocol, we can give financial access to those in need without the government’s approval or relying on intermediaries such as banks or payment processors. Cutting out the middlemen organizations, thanks to blockchain, ensures transparency and cost efficiency, with more funds getting into the hands of the refugees. This makes our protocol a trustable, efficient, and more sustainable source for supporting the displaced people long-term and in a dictatorship-resistant way.
Thanks to its community-based approach, our protocol also allows refugees to take ownership of UBI initiatives, which is more empowering than a centralized authority with no connection to their communities.
Likewise, since most refugees are undocumented, they cannot reach social programs or start rebuilding their lives. At impactMarket, we help refugees regardless of their identification, and we are changing the narrative by giving power to the people over their circumstances.
What they have achieved with so little inspires us every day and shows how powerful and resilient refugees are against all odds.
Now, it’s your turn to be borderless and change a life today!
Be the impact you want to see in the world and help us to build a better future for humanity.
Make your donations to support vulnerable refugee communities:
Afghanistan — Mostly victims of war and the extremely poor and vulnerable people who cannot pay for their basic needs.
Brazil — SupportingVenezuelan immigrants and refugees who fled their country due to the critical political and economic crisis in Venezuela.
Ghana — Most have escaped war-torn situations around Africa and face extreme discrimination in their host country.
India — Refugees from religious minorities, in Afghanistan, like the Sikh community. The vast majority of them suffer from violent attacks and forced conversion.
Kenya — Refugees from Kakuma Refugee Camp, the world’s largest camp with over 184,000 people who lack financial resources and basic needs.
Malawi — Temporary holding place for refugees from the DRC Congo, Mozambique, and Somalia who are escaping war.
Myanmar — Internally Displaced Persons (IDP)community supporting people who have been displaced as a result of indiscriminate attacks.
Peru — Venezuelan immigrants and refugees in different regions of Peru.
Ukraine — Community created by impactMarket to support people from Ukraine who are fleeing the war.
Any questions, you can reach out to us on our social media, impactmarket.com, docs.impactmarket.com, or directly by emailing us at hello@impactmarket.com.
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impactMarket (the application layer protocol)
Open, free, censorship-resistant, and borderless impact-driven crowdfinance marketplace to fight poverty. It operates as a DAO, on top of the Celo network, using cUSD (Celo Dollar) as the main digital currency and $PACT as its governance token, while running autonomously through smart contracts.
impactLabs (the company)
Based in Portugal, was founded in Nov 2020, by Marco Barbosa, Bernardo Vieira, Afonso Barbosa, and eSolidar. The company is focused on building inclusive and decentralized systems to fight poverty, and disrupt access to finance while driving DeFi adoption.
