6 Projects Using NFTs for Social Good

NFT

Whereas the motivations of hypothesis and standing could reign inside the NFT neighborhood, there may be one other use case for Web3 tasks that has been on show this yr — social good.

NFT collections, metaverse activations and DAO fundraisers can all be leveraged to lift cash for charitable causes, from environmental tasks to humanitarian initiatives.

This vacation season, Blockworks rounded up a few of the high examples of metaverse activations and NFT tasks used for social good in 2022.

Preserving cultural heritage

Quantum Temple is a startup that’s trying to leverage Web3 to guard and protect the cultural heritage of communities world wide.

By documenting tradition and traditions within the type of NFTs, Quantum Temple hopes to lift consciousness and attraction to acutely aware collectors and vacationers who want to help these communities. These digital property are curated and verified by anthropologists.

UNESCO defines cultural heritage as oral traditions and expressions, performing arts, rituals and festive occasions, information and practices regarding nature and the universe, and conventional craftsmanship.

For instance, one of many first tasks, at the moment in improvement, is a set of cultural heritage NFTs centered on Bali, Indonesia that characteristic the ‘Cendrawasih’ dance, which means the dance of the ‘Chook of Paradise.’ This ritual comes from Legong, a refined classical dance in Bali, and relies on the courtship rituals of Cendrawasih birds.

Professor Steve Lansing and adviser to the challenge mentioned that this strategy “opens up new methods for communities to share their heritage with the world and generates new income streams to straight profit communities and artists” through NFT proceeds.

Movies of the Cendrawasih dance will likely be preserved for posterity on the Ethereum and Algorand blockchains and can profit the Legong Dance Faculty in Se Bali. Video and picture information are saved on the Interplanetary File System (IPFS) distributed file storage protocol, the Quantum Temple group mentioned, a standard approach for NFTs tasks involving media.

One of many dancers featured within the assortment, Ni Kadek Virna Erikayani, mentioned that she needs “the worldwide neighborhood to raised perceive my residence tradition and values, in order that we are able to develop to respect one another, help one another, and perceive one another.”

Web3 training

Upland, an EOS blockchain-based metaverse platform that’s linked to geographical international locations and cities, partnered with UNICEF Brazil to develop a digital Web3 academy that gives know-how coaching to Brazilian younger adults.

Two UNICEF-branded buildings have been constructed within the digital Rio de Janeiro on Upland and a vacation NFT fundraiser is underway. Customers should purchase the UNICEF Winter Gnomes and UNICEF Winter Ornaments to brighten their Upland houses and properties.

The sale’s proceeds will likely be used as a direct donation to the United Nations Kids’s Fund, together with devoted funds to help and sponsor the education schemes of UNICEF in Brazil, in keeping with Upland.

UNICEF didn’t instantly return a request for remark.

Roughly 50% of proceeds from the Upland fundraiser energy UNICEF’s One Million Alternatives (1MiO) program, which supplies alternatives for skilled coaching, employability and earnings technology for younger adults (from 14 to 29 years outdated) in conditions of vulnerability.

College students will likely be each bodily and nearly educated within the fundamentals of Web3, blockchain know-how, good contracts and metaverse fundamentals, in keeping with Upland.

Programs will educate college students digital abilities on the subject of utilizing the Upland metaverse, in addition to methods to apply these studying to crypto staking, tokenization and different Web3 associated training. There can even be lessons to be taught entrepreneurial abilities and on methods to determine job alternatives within the metaverse economic system and Web3 business.

Healthcare in Africa

NFTs are getting used to deal with the UN’s sustainable improvement objectives on the subject of healthcare. The Girls in Innovation Fund (WiN Fund), co-founded by Reckitt, is utilizing the proceeds from NFTs gross sales to spend money on women-led healthcare startups in Africa, addressing the UN’s third such purpose — good well being and well-being.

The advantages of blockchain for healthcare and democracy are being explored in international locations with unstable management.

Girls are extra attuned to the healthcare wants of their neighborhood, in keeping with Corinne Momal-Vanian, the manager director of the Kofi Annan Basis. “Girls entrepreneurs — from what we’ve seen in Africa — can drive innovation, can drive effectivity and may actually have a spot within the healthcare ecosystem that governments can’t fill,” she mentioned at a UN-adjacent roundtable dialogue in New York in September.

WiN Fund co-founder Pradeep Kakkattil, pointed to a worrying statistic: Solely 2% of enterprise capital investments globally go to women-led enterprises, even if women-led companies ship 35% increased returns and create 6 instances extra jobs.

Celebrating variations

The Sandbox and the group Folks of Crypto Lab (POC) debuted the ‘Valley of Belonging.’’ They described it as a ‘cultureverse’ or a variety, fairness and inclusivity hub within the metaverse that highlights the significance of an equitable Web3 neighborhood. Which means utilizing their digital area to amplify creators, builders and types that symbolize folks of all races, ethnicity and backgrounds.

Their first challenge onboarded the cosmetics model NYX Skilled Make-up in The Sandbox to have a good time Satisfaction Month through an 8,430 NFT avatar assortment that includes voxelized make-up appears to be like on the avatars.

Avatar traits included over 36 pores and skin shades and eight NYX appears to be like to point out that make-up has no gender or sexual orientation. Extra customizable traits ranged from prosthetic limbs to varied Muslim head coverings such because the hijab.

This activation even sought to symbolize handicapped neighborhood members by together with non-player characters (NPCs) in wheelchairs, guiding gamers by way of particular quests and mini video games.

NYX donated 100% of its proceeds amounting to $50,000 from the bought out sale of the avatar NFTs to the Los Angeles LGBT Middle.

Wildlife conservation

Netherlands-based decentralized carbon credit score trade Coorest and conservation consulting agency PLCnetwork of the Southern Hemisphere teamed as much as tokenize particular person real-world endangered animals at recreation reserves and privately owned conservation areas in Africa. These wildlife NFTs allow holders to sponsor an elephant, lion, cheetah or rhino. Earnings from the gross sales will go towards meals, shelter and safety for the animals they symbolize.

Coorest — finest recognized for working an NFTrees CO2 compensation system that tokenizes yield-bearing property or bonds and carbon credit which might be tradable on the blockchain — partnered with PLCnetwork of the Southern Hemisphere with connections to wildlife reserves in South Africa, Zimbabwe and Botswana.

In line with PLCnetwork founder Dr. Julia Baum, the principle problem with on the bottom wildlife conservation is that “it’s expensive and assets are sometimes very restricted.” Even for a personal reserve with a usually greater funds, the price of taking good care of an African bush elephant, for instance, will be very costly as a result of it consists of fencing, monitoring, 24-hour anti-poaching patrols and veterinary help.

Proudly owning an “elephaNFT” or a “lioNFT” doesn’t give possession over the animals, reasonably it supplies month-to-month “proof-of-life” verification that the animal remains to be alive. The metadata of every NFT incorporates details about the species, age and gender, particular to every tokenized animal. Holders can even be invited to go to the wildlife reserve and meet the animals. 70% of the funds from these Wildlife NFTs go to the sport reserve or conservation space, with the funds launched on a month-to-month or set schedule.

Help for Ukraine

Crypto donors flocked in the direction of Ukraine supporting causes when the Russian-Ukraine battle began in February, and examined the facility of DAOs (decentralized autonomous organizations) as fundraising instruments.

Ukraine DAO ended up elevating $8 million in solely a few days from the sale of an NFT of the Ukrainian flag. Proceeds went in the direction of nonprofits and non-governmental organizations. Ukrainian-born activist Alona Shevchenko reached out to Pussy Riot’s Nadya Tolokonnikova to prepare the group.

After solely two weeks of battle, over 102,000 crypto asset donations, totaling $54.7 million in ether, bitcoin and tether, had been tracked, supporting the Ukrainian authorities and Come Again Alive, an NGO offering help to the navy.

The federal government turned to Twitter to ask folks to donate crypto. It even based a nonprofit battle fund — Support For Ukraine — which reported spending $54 million of its crypto donations on navy {hardware} by August. Based by Ukraine’s Ministry of Digital Transformation in March, round $11 million went to unmanned aerial autos, adopted intently by armor vests, laptop {hardware} and software program.

One other group that raised an emergency response fund for Ukraine is The Giving Block — a crypto donation platform that gives charities with back-end help.

In line with The Giving Block, ether was the most-donated cryptocurrency in 2021, totaling $30.79 million.

2022 noticed numerous extra Web3 tasks and fundraising efforts as blockchain know-how sought to influence every kind of industries from training and healthcare to magnificence. Whether or not it’s NFT or DAO fundraisers or metaverse activations, blockchain know-how has its benevolent aspect.