By Milica Begovic, Carlo Ruiz, Marina Petrovic and Ruchi Mohanty Can we take a bite out of poverty through the simple act of buying a chocolate bar? UNDP (Country Office Ecuador, Istanbul Hub's innovation team) and FairChain Foundation tested this with The Other Bar- a chocolate bar that comes with a 'digital passport' (tracks cocoa from bean to a bar), and an impact token that acts as a supercharged brand marketing campaign and allows consumers to reinvest in farmers who brought them the bar. The experiment tested the hypothesis that consumers will reward sustainable business practices and brands (over non-sustainable ones) and are likely to pay a premium price ona product that is: Based on a sustainably managed natural resource Clearly co...

 A whole series of new solar projects in Moldova, Georgia, Serbia and Tajikistan are going to be financed through crowdfunding campaigns. Citizens from these countries, but also from all round the world will have the opportunity to participate in solarization of this region!We will start with the youngest in Serbia. The future belongs to them and must be renewable so the city of Kragujevac will crowdfund for a PV installation on the roof of a kindergarten. Energy independence of the building will be done with the assistance of the first Serbian energy cooperative from the city of Šabac, under the Solar Mayors' Club Initiative.Education of children is an extra benefit of this kind of projects, and another one is...

​New York — The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and Islamic Development Bank (IsDB) today launched a renewed action plan to strengthen collaboration in support of national efforts to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).The new plan builds on UNDP's and IsDB's commitment to cooperate in shared priority areas such as crisis response and recovery, poverty reduction, private sector development, capacity-building, and knowledge-sharing. "This joint plan of action between IsDB and UNDP will support achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals in the countries we serve around the globe and will identify new opportunities to work together," said UNDP Administrator Achim Steiner. "I look forward to piloting new initiativ...

​By UNDP and Magic LeapIn the blockbuster science fiction movie 'The Matrix', after Neo takes the red pill offered by Morpheus, he not only learns the truth about reality, he also discovers how an ecological disaster has led to humans being harvested and enslaved by machines. At UNDP we wondered, what if we 'matrix' our way into tackling climate change, using emerging technologies to create urgency and kick start political action. After all, we're in uncharted territory, or as writer James Bridle in 'The New Dark Age' calls it 'peak knowledge.'We went straight to the source — to Magic Leap, whose Senior Vice President for Creative Strategy, John Gaeta, created all the special effects in 'The Matrix'. What did we learn?Several studies indica...

Why UNDP, the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB), and Islamic Solidarity Fund (ISF) are launching a programme to strengthen NGOs in 57 countriesMany countries in the Muslim world face daunting development challenges. In the Arab region despite steady progress in reducing poverty and boosting health and education, political fragility, instability, and recurrent conflicts present immense stumbling blocks on the course to implementing the 2030 Agenda.Despite this, many Muslim countries have extended generous support to their neighbours; they represent eight of the top 12 refugee-hosting countries. How do we capitalize on such solidarity and grassroots networks to solve some of the most difficult development issues countries in the Islamic world?A...

​In June members of the UNDP met at Magic Leap's London Offices for some demonstrations of the company's cutting edge technology. The UNDP has been in conversation with Magic Leap discussing the idea of using spatial computing to help with their ongoing mission and particularly to highlight climate change but when exploring the possibilities of the Magic Leap One, seeing truly is believing.Quote from Cassie- her impressions of seeing Magic Leap device.No one is more aware than the UNDP of the difficulties getting people excited about environmental damage or take climate change seriously. One of the main reasons is that the bulk of climate change takes place in places that are far removed from our daily lives.Th...

 This blog series takes a look at the new landscape of financing for development, the focus of our upcoming Istanbul Development Dialogues, an annual a global development forum where policy-makers, business leaders, and experts discuss issues of our time.Islamic finance, a method of financial system which complies with sharia law and forbids charging interest, has become a growing source of funding for development. Because inclusion, women's empowerment, fairness, accountability and sustainability are embedded in its principles, if offers a natural connection with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).UNDP has been exploring ways to increase Islamic finance's impact by linking Indonesia and Turkey together, through UNDP Alternative ...

 Lisbon, 18 March – The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), together with mayors from eight countries - Moldova, Serbia, Georgia, Tajikistan, Croatia, Somalia, Lebanon and Portugal - today launched a new initiative to boost financing for solar energy in cities across the world.The Solar Mayors platform will connect cities around the topic of energy transition and production of solar energy in urban contexts. Functioning as an online community, the platform represents an opportunity for Mayors to learn about the latest trends in the industry, share best practices, and collectively promote citizen engagement.The platform encourages peer-to-peer learning and cooperation with the private sector and NGOs, two factors recognized as ...

 Technology Innovation and Entrepreneurship Center (TIEC), United Nations Development Programme in Egypt (UNDP Egypt) and the UNDP Alternative Finance Lab (AltFinLab) partnered together to foster crowdfunding in Egypt during the week of 3rd to the 7th February 2019. In 2017, $65 billion was raised on global crowdfunding platforms and there is an upward trend in developing countries in adopting crowdfunding as a source of finance. This is particularly interesting for Egyptian SMEs, as only 50% of SMEs in the formal sector currently engage with banks. Crowdfunding lowers barriers of access to finance and matches demand and supply of finance as it allows individuals to make contributions and investments directly to projects they are passi...

Imagine losing your legal identification and other official documents in a natural disaster, as thousands of Haitians did in the deadly 2010 earthquake. Without land title, rebuilding your home or business becomes impossible: Why invest in rebuilding at all when someone else can come along and claim your property?Imagine trying to register for school, open a bank account, secure health care or other benefits, marry, vote, get a passport, or travel without the ability to prove who you are.Around 1 billion people live in this situation today (World Bank, 2018), many of them refugees, migrants, or children born in the poorest, most remote regions of the globe with little or no capacity to collect data and generate durable records.Blockchain, a...

Who can imagine Valentine's Day without bon-bons, or Easter without chocolate eggs? Yet generations-old cocoa farming businesses are on the verge of collapse in the Amazon because cocoa farmers don't receive fair pay for their work. Using blockchain technology, the United Nations Development Programme in Ecuador, AltFinLab and Amsterdam's FairChain Foundation are developing one of the world's first blockchain shared-value chocolate bars.   Best known as the technology behind cryptocurrencies, blockchain is still too new and cutting edge for many industries. However, as AltFinLab points out in its White Paper 'The Future is Decentralized', blockchain can potentially revolutionize the food industry. Blockchain data cannot be manipul...

 In 2018 the UNDP Innovation Facility issued a Call for Proposals to promote development through the innovative use of Artificial Intelligence, big data, behavioural insights and impact financing. A record of more than 195 proposals were received, and 29 winners chosen from 35 countries. UNDP Lebanon, UNDP AltFinLab and its partners won with a proposal which will help to reinvigorate the country's ancient cedar forests.The Syria crisis has placed a great strain on its immediate neighbour Lebanon. The country of just over six million has taken in more than a million refugees in the past seven years. Its infrastructure, public finances, and environment are suffering as a result, and Lebanon doesn't have the money to cope. According to th...

 Many people around the world say they don't contribute to social causes for fear that their contributions will be wasted. So how is it that a board game on Kickstarter mangadom managed to collect over $12 million in funding, with almost 20,000 pledges?That's the beauty of crowdfunding: people from all walks of life supporting a cause they believe in. We at UNDP's AltFinLab campaigns understand that crowdfunding is about more than collecting money — that we achieve the best results when we apply the platform approach to crowdfunding. It helps us diversify funding, involve the right people, and mobilize experts from all walks of life.In Turkey, the situation is different. People do not engage with charity or donations as frequently as t...

Panama, August 31, 2018- With a financing gap of 2.5 billion dollars to implement the Sustainable Development Goals and two out of every six people in the world without access to a formal bank account, innovative financial mechanisms represent an alternative to close the financial gap and promote sustainable development.This is said by the team of experts in alternative finance of the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), Marina Petrović and Robert Pasicko. They run the Alternative Finance Lab (AltFin Lab), an initiative created in 2016 to explore and take advantage of new financial technologies and mechanisms to access investment."Due to the increasingly changing world of today, governments, citizens and development actors must adapt ...

​Hardly a day goes by in the development world without hearing the term "platform". Like in the business world, it's becoming harder for any development organization to provide a single service or product that will make broad impact. Airbnb doesn't build homes, it creates a network that brings together host and guest.Likewise, it's impossible to eradicate poverty – a complex phenomenon – without connecting different areas of expertise and partners across a wide range of thematic issues. And it's often the case that the people we're trying to pull out of poverty are closer to the problem and entitled to have a say about the solution.While building platforms doesn't happen overnight, it's highly likely you're already working in ways that rese...

With the arrival of the 4th industrial revolution, new technologies will increasingly enable citizens to engage with governments, voice their opinions and coordinate their efforts. Because of the increasingly changing world of today, governments, citizens and development actors alike need to quickly adapt, get a better understanding of advanced technologies, and learn how they can best be used for the benefit of the society as a whole.The new UNDP's strategic approach is relying on innovation and experimentation to ensure that key development actors are able to use new technologies to drive the progress towards the achievement of the Agenda 2030 and the global Sustainable Development Goals. To be able to do so and help the governments of fu...

Impact bonds, one of the pay-for-success financial mechanisms bringing impact investors, private, public and third sector organizations together to solve social and development issues, have recently faced some criticism about their complex nature, which can lead to a long design phase and high related transaction costs. We, at UNDP Istanbul Hub and Finnish Innovation Fund Sitra, put our heads together and thought about the challenges around impact bonds. There was a mutual understanding that what comes to preventing and solving wicked societal problems, the impact is achieved together – the core idea and benefit of impact bonds. Sitra has been using co-creation as a mechanism to boost the design of social impact bonds (SIB) in Finland and w...

 The Benefits of Crowd UrbanismBased on lessons learned – some of which are mentioned below – crowdfunding can bridge the gap between top-down and bottom-up ways of thinking.The United Nations Development Program (UNDP) Alternative Finance Lab has been working and experimenting with crowdfunding now more than five years, by developing campaigns, workshops, booklets and observing how this new way of financing can help communities to become more resilient and empowered.Due to fiscal constraints governments are facing globally, conventional means of financing municipal projects are at risk, opening the floor for various alternative financing mechanisms.Crowdfunding mechanisms are one of the fastest growing: they can help leverage public f...

UNDP AltFinLab partnered with Blockchain.com, UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), and the World Economic Forum (WEF) to explore how block chain technology works, but also how it is already being used to pursue conventional ends. The culmination of that partnership is in the form of a white paper titled, The Future is Decentralised.We're excited to share how this technology has brought new levels of efficiency and effectiveness to the fields of development aid, supply chain management, renewable energy, economic growth, and several others.The potential of block chains to disrupt industrial sectors, commercial processes, governmental structures or economic systems seems to know no bounds. We suggest that the transformative power of block chain technol...

    The Day of Big Waves in February in Banja Luka. What? Yes, we have the first successful crowdfunding campaign in Bosnia and Herzegovina by "Talas" magazine team. Talas means wave! The campaign name was "Swim upstream" or #PlivajUzvodno. There is no ocean in Banja Luka to make waves or to swim, but Talas magazine team has done their job! They started a quarterly print magazine back in June 2016, determined to write only positive stories about great, productive, proactive and enthusiastic people in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Those stories deserve to be told and inspire other people to strive in making a positive change, starting a business, creating jobs, doing good for themselves and for the community. They went into a crowdfundin...