$1 Million USD Donated by Ethereum Classic Labs to UNICEF Ventures

On Friday online news channel Cheddar broke the story that Ethereum Classic Labs is donating $1 Million to UNICEF and it’s cryptocurrency innovation fund.

The $1 Million donation includes $250k into UNICEF’s venture fund, with $750k of follow on funding for 3 of their portfolio companies. As of now it’s unclear if it is a fiat, or cryptocurrency donations.

You can watch the interview with Terry Culver, CEO of Ethereum Classic Labs and Cecilia Shapiro, Funding Advisor and Blockchain Supervisor at UNICEF Ventures below:

UNICEF Ventures will use the funds to invest in companies that are in emerging economies that UNICEF is active in, with a focus on technologies like blockchain, drones, artificial intelligence, virtual reality and augmented reality. The organization has a strong incentive to measure the ROI of their investments with the technology that is developed, so there is a focus on open source software.

The UNICEF venture fund was launched in 2016, with an initial $17.9 million investment, with the mission of making $50-100k investments in technologies for children developed in UNICEF country offices or by partner companies in countries where a UNICEF program operates allowing these technology solutions to quickly scale up and provide benefit to children in these countries. Currently they have 72 investments, including 32 startups and plan to increase this by 30 per year.

When asked about how blockchain could help in these locations, Culver said mentioned use cases such as enhancing the delivery of aid, by using blockchain to ensure transparency, tracking where and how effective the aid is. Another use case mentioned is secure, digital identity, for displaced persons such as refugees.

This won’t be the last of Ethereum Classic Labs donations in the space, as the organization plans to invest in more startups that are creating digital goods in the public space as part of their accelerator program.

Donate to UNICEF and other crypto friendly nonprofit organizations by visiting our full list at bitcointuesday.org and make a cryptocurrency donation today.