Last updated 5 months ago
Informal African businesses lack access to credit, stifling growth, innovation, and stability, trapping entrepreneurs in poverty and limiting economic potential.
A Cardano-based cooperative smart contract offers secure, transparent credit for Africa’s informal businesses, boosting growth, trust, and inclusion while reducing dependence on traditional finance.
Please provide your proposal title
Cardano Decentralized Credit dApp for Informal Business
Enter the amount of funding you are requesting in ADA
99922
Please specify how many months you expect your project to last
6
What is the problem you want to solve?
Informal African businesses lack access to credit, stifling growth, innovation, and stability, trapping entrepreneurs in poverty and limiting economic potential.
Supporting links
Does your project have any dependencies on other organizations, technical or otherwise?
No
Describe any dependencies or write 'No dependencies'
The solution is designed for scalability and user-friendliness, integrating blockchain security with intuitive interfaces for business owners, and reduce
Will your project's outputs be fully open source?
Yes
Please provide details on the intellectual property (IP) status of your project outputs, including whether they will be released as open source or retained under another licence.
Our Cardano-based cooperative smart contract dApp uses open-source components like Plutus and Cardano Node (Apache 2.0), wallet tools (MIT/Apache 2.0), and optional platforms like Demeter. All dependencies are tracked via a Software Bill of Materials and monitored with tools like Dependabot for license compliance and security. This transparent, auditable design ensures sustainability, fosters community innovation, and reduces vendor lock-in for lasting impact.
Please choose the most relevant theme and tag related to the outcomes of your proposal
Financial Services
Describe what makes your idea innovative compared to what has been previously launched in the market (whether by you or others).
Unlike most funded Cardano projects that focus on DeFi for already banked users, our cooperative smart contract targets Africa’s informal sector—an underserved market excluded from traditional finance. By integrating Atala PRISM for decentralized identity and a credit cooperative model, we enable trust, transparency, and shared risk, creating a scalable, inclusive finance solution that merges blockchain security with real-world economic empowerment.
Describe what your prototype or MVP will demonstrate, and where it can be accessed.
The MVP will showcase a fully functional cooperative credit system on Cardano testnet, integrating smart contracts with Atala PRISM for secure identity verification, a responsive dApp interface, and basic credit issuance/repayment workflows. It will be accessible via a public web link, with source code released under an open-source license on GitHub, allowing community review, testing, and contributions prior to mainnet deployment.allowing community review, feedback, and contributions.
Describe realistic measures of success, ideally with on-chain metrics.
Success will be measured by:
Please describe your proposed solution and how it addresses the problem
Summary Solution
The Ubuntu dApp leverages Cardano’s blockchain to imprint Africa’s traditional cooperative systems into a secure, transparent, and scalable smart contract framework, delivering collateral-free credit at less than 2% interest to informal sector businesses. By encoding cooperative principles—such as savings mobilization and mutual trust—into a decentralized application (dApp), the project empowers informal entrepreneurs with financial access, fostering economic growth and driving Cardano adoption. The solution uses a bottom-up approach to ensure grassroots participation, aligning with the Cardano Use Cases: Concepts category by developing a proof-of-concept (PoC) prototype to validate this innovative model.
Solution Detailed
The Ubuntu dApp builds on the traditional African cooperative model, where informal businesses form groups to contribute flat fees into a pool fund, which is disbursed to members on a rotating basis without requiring collateral. This practice, rooted in mutual trust and community governance, has sustained informal economies despite financial exclusion. The Ubuntu dApp modernizes this system by deploying a cooperative smart contract on Cardano, ensuring security, transparency, and efficiency. Key features of the solution include:Cooperative Group Formation: Informal businesses can form cooperative groups of 3, 5, or 7 members through the dApp to access credit. These groups act as mutual guarantors, eliminating the need for collateral and reducing risk through collective accountability.
The Ubuntu dApp leverages Cardano’s Extended UTxO (EUTxO) model for secure, deterministic transactions and Plutus smart contracts for flexible, programmable logic. By imprinting traditional cooperative operations on-chain, the dApp ensures immutability, auditability, and resistance to fraud, addressing risks inherent in informal systems. The low transaction fees on Cardano make the solution cost-effective for small-scale entrepreneurs, while its decentralized nature eliminates reliance on centralized financial institutions, which often exclude informal businesses due to documentation barriers (World Bank, 2008).
Bottom-Up Approach for Sustainability
The project adopts a bottom-up approach to ensure grassroots ownership and sustainability. By building on existing cooperative structures—deeply embedded in African communities, from extended families to mutual farming groups—the Ubuntu dApp aligns with cultural and economic practices. Community engagement, including workshops and local partnerships in Ghana (the initial rollout region), will drive adoption and empower informal businesses to co-own the platform. This approach addresses socio-economic challenges by fostering participation, trust, and scalability, ensuring the solution is demand-driven and culturally relevant.
Market Research and Economic Impact
The informal sector dominates African economies, yet credit constraints limit its potential. Research indicates that doubling credit flow to the private sector could increase GDP growth by 2% (Caprio & Honohan, 2001). Disruptions in credit supply significantly hamper economic activity (Melzer, 2007), and documentation barriers exclude informal businesses from formal finance (World Bank, 2008). In Ghana, small enterprises rely on non-bank sources, with loan amounts tied to monthly cash flow, indicating a disciplined borrowing culture (Domeher et al., 2014). The Ubuntu dApp capitalizes on this by formalizing cooperative credit systems on-chain, offering low-cost, accessible loans that align with businesses’ financial capacity. By targeting Ghana’s 15,000 cooperative societies and expanding regionally, the project aims to unlock economic potential and demonstrate Cardano’s utility in financial inclusion.
Prototype / MVP Description
Our MVP will demonstrate a functional cooperative smart contract on Cardano enabling pooled credit issuance, repayment tracking, and governance for informal businesses. Integrated with Atala PRISM for verifiable digital identities, it will show how members can securely join a cooperative, apply for credit, vote on approvals, and transparently track repayments—all without relying on traditional banks. The MVP will be accessible as a web-based dApp with a simple mobile-friendly interface, hosted on a public testnet. Open-source code and documentation will be available on GitHub, allowing community review, feedback, and contributions.
Technical Implementation and Dependencies
The Ubuntu dApp relies on Inversion, a specialist Cardano development firm and Cardano enterprise partner (https://inversion.dev/#aboutus)) for technical expertise and dApp development. Inversion will:
Measures of Success
Success will be measured by:
Alignment with Cardano Use Cases: Concepts
The Ubuntu dApp is a novel concept that validates a Cardano-based cooperative credit model for Africa’s informal sector. By developing a PoC prototype, the project demonstrates:Innovation: Encoding traditional cooperatives into smart contracts is a pioneering use case, leveraging Cardano’s EUTxO model for secure, low-cost credit delivery.
Adoption: With 500 million cooperative members across Africa (serves as a huge niche), starting in Ghana, the dApp drives Cardano usage among underserved communities. This project is target 500 cooperative members and scaling gradually.
Impact: By providing collateral-free credit at 2% interest, the project unlocks economic potential, aligning with Cardano’s mission of financial inclusion.
Scalability: The bottom-up approach and open-source codebase ensure the model can scale to other African regions, fostering community-driven growth.
Innovative Edge of the Solution
Unlike many funded Cardano projects that focus on DeFi products for already-banked users or niche token economies, this solution directly targets Africa’s vast informal business sector—a demographic historically excluded from blockchain-based credit systems. By combining cooperative smart contracts with Atala PRISM decentralized identity and an open-source licensing framework, it enables trust-based credit without traditional collateral, supports regulatory alignment, and fosters community ownership. This integration bridges on-chain governance, real-world economic activity, and inclusive financial access in a way no previous Cardano-funded project has delivered.
Conclusion
The Ubuntu dApp transforms traditional African cooperatives into a secure, transparent, and scalable credit system on Cardano, addressing financial exclusion for informal businesses. By leveraging Inversion’s expertise, Cardano’s robust infrastructure, and a bottom-up approach, the project delivers a PoC that validates an innovative business model, driving Cardano adoption and economic empowerment in Africa.
Please define the positive impact your project will have on the wider Cardano community
The Ubuntu dApp leverages Cardano’s blockchain to deliver a novel cooperative smart contract solution, providing secure, transparent, and collateral-free credit at less than 2% interest to informal sector businesses in Africa. By encoding traditional African cooperative models—where groups of 3, 5, or 7 members pool resources and disburse funds rotationally—into a decentralized application (dApp), the project addresses financial exclusion for over 500 million cooperative members across Africa, starting in Ghana.
The Ubuntu dApp introduces Cardano to a vast, underserved market of informal entrepreneurs in Africa, where cooperatives are a cornerstone of economic activity (e.g., 14 million members in Kenya, 132,000 cooperatives in South Africa, 15,000 in Ghana). By offering a scalable, low-cost credit solution, the dApp incentivizes millions of new users to engage with Cardano’s blockchain, creating wallets, transacting in ADA, and interacting with smart contracts. This influx of users from a high-growth region strengthens Cardano’s global user base, positioning it as a leading blockchain for financial inclusion. The project’s focus on low transaction fees—enabled by Cardano’s efficient Extended UTxO (EUTxO) model—ensures accessibility for low-income entrepreneurs, making Cardano the preferred platform for grassroots financial services.
The Ubuntu dApp demonstrates Cardano’s technical capabilities in a real-world use case, highlighting its scalability, security, and cost-efficiency. The cooperative smart contract, built on Plutus, showcases Cardano’s ability to handle complex, multi-party financial transactions with deterministic outcomes, ensuring trust and transparency. By serving informal businesses with limited resources, the dApp proves Cardano’s low-fee structure is ideal for microtransactions, a critical feature for emerging markets. This PoC will serve as a reference for developers, illustrating how to build scalable dApps on Cardano, thus encouraging more projects to leverage its infrastructure. The project’s success will reinforce Cardano’s reputation as a blockchain that delivers practical, impactful solutions, attracting developers, investors, and users to the ecosystem.
The Ubuntu dApp aligns with Cardano’s mission to empower underserved communities by providing collateral-free credit at less than 2% interest, significantly lower than market rates (often >20% in Africa). This enables informal businesses—such as farmers, traders, and artisans—to access capital without the documentation barriers that exclude them from traditional finance (World Bank, 2008). By integrating identity and accounting tools, the dApp helps businesses build on-chain credit profiles, enhancing their financial credibility for future opportunities. This impact extends beyond individual users, as increased economic activity in the informal sector can boost GDP growth by up to 2% with doubled credit access (Caprio & Honohan, 2001). The Cardano Community benefits from this positive social impact, as it strengthens the blockchain’s brand as a tool for economic empowerment, attracting mission-driven developers and organizations to build on Cardano.
The project’s bottom-up approach, rooted in Africa’s cooperative traditions, fosters community engagement by involving local stakeholders in Ghana and beyond. By partnering with existing cooperatives and conducting workshops, the Ubuntu dApp ensures grassroots adoption, creating a model for community-driven projects on Cardano. The open-source nature of the dApp, hosted on a public GitHub repository under permissive licenses (e.g., Apache 2.0, MIT), invites Cardano developers to contribute, adapt, and extend the solution to other regions or use cases. Engagement with the Cardano developer community via the Cardano Forum and Stack Exchange will share insights from the PoC, encouraging collaborative innovation. This strengthens the Cardano Community’s cohesion, as developers and users collaborate to refine and scale the solution, fostering a vibrant ecosystem of shared knowledge and resources.
The Ubuntu dApp contributes to Cardano’s open-source ecosystem by developing and sharing a Plutus-based smart contract for cooperative credit systems. This codebase, along with documentation and testing frameworks, will be publicly available, providing a blueprint for similar financial inclusion projects. By leveraging tools like the Cardano Node, Plutus Application Framework, and wallet integration libraries (e.g., Lucid, Mesh.js), the project validates their utility, encouraging broader adoption by developers. The use of Demeter or Docker for streamlined development further demonstrates how Cardano’s infrastructure supports efficient dApp creation, inspiring other developers to build on the platform. This contribution enriches the Cardano Community’s developer resources, accelerating the creation of new use cases and reinforcing Cardano’s position as a developer-friendly blockchain.
The Ubuntu dApp positions Cardano as a competitive alternative to other blockchains by showcasing its unique features in a high-impact use case. Cardano’s EUTxO model ensures predictable transaction costs, critical for microfinance applications in low-income settings. The Plutus platform’s flexibility enables sophisticated governance mechanics, such as on-chain voting for dispute resolution, which enhances trust in the cooperative system. By delivering a PoC that outperforms traditional financial systems in cost, accessibility, and transparency, the project highlights Cardano’s advantages over centralized solutions and competing blockchains. This strengthens Cardano’s market position, attracting institutional interest and partnerships, which benefit the entire community through increased investment and visibility.
Starting in Ghana, with its 15,000 cooperative societies, the Ubuntu dApp lays the foundation for regional expansion across Africa’s 500 million cooperative members. Success in Ghana will create a replicable model, encouraging Cardano-based projects in other high-growth regions. This scalability demonstrates Cardano’s potential to address global challenges, enhancing its relevance and appeal to international developers, investors, and policymakers. The project’s focus on a bottom-up approach ensures cultural and economic alignment, making it a flagship use case for Cardano’s global impact. As the dApp scales, it will drive ADA transactions, wallet creation, and network activity, boosting Cardano’s economic ecosystem and rewarding stakeholders, including validators and delegators.
By addressing a critical socio-economic challenge—credit access for informal businesses—the Ubuntu dApp builds trust in Cardano’s ability to deliver meaningful solutions. The project’s transparent, on-chain governance and low-cost credit model mitigate risks like fraud and mismanagement, common in traditional cooperatives. Security audits by Inversion ensure the dApp is robust, protecting user funds and data. This reliability enhances Cardano’s credibility as a trusted blockchain for financial applications, encouraging more users and developers to join the ecosystem. The project’s alignment with Cardano’s mission-driven ethos further strengthens community pride and commitment, fostering a sense of shared purpose.
Conclusion
The Ubuntu dApp delivers transformative impacts to the Cardano Community by driving adoption in Africa’s informal sector, showcasing Cardano’s technical strengths, and fostering financial inclusion. It strengthens community engagement, enriches the open-source ecosystem, and positions Cardano as a leader in decentralized finance for underserved markets. By validating a novel cooperative credit model through a PoC, the project catalyzes Cardano’s growth, attracts diverse stakeholders, and reinforces its global relevance, ensuring long-term benefits for the entire community.
What is your capability to deliver your project with high levels of trust and accountability? How do you intend to validate if your approach is feasible?
We outline the feasibility of the project, detailing its technical and operational viability, and the capability of the team to deliver a robust proof-of-concept (PoC) prototype, ensuring alignment with Cardano’s mission to drive adoption and innovation.
Technical Feasibility
The Ubuntu dApp is technically feasible due to Cardano’s robust blockchain infrastructure and the project’s alignment with established tools and standards. Key aspects include:
Smart Contract Development: The cooperative smart contract will be built using Plutus, Cardano’s native smart contract platform based on Haskell, leveraging the Extended UTxO (EUTxO) model for secure, deterministic transactions. Plutus supports complex logic for cooperative credit pools, including group formation, fund disbursement, repayment tracking, and governance mechanics for dispute resolution. Cardano’s low transaction fees (typically, 0.2 ADA) ensure cost-effectiveness for microtransactions, critical for informal businesses with limited resources.
dApp Architecture: The dApp will feature a user-friendly frontend for loan applications and repayments, integrated with Cardano wallets (e.g., Nami, Eternl, Lace) via the CIP-30 dApp connector standard. Backend logic, built using the Plutus Application Framework (PAF), will handle off-chain transaction construction, ensuring seamless blockchain interaction. Open-source libraries like Lucid or Mesh.js will simplify wallet integration, reducing development complexity.
Testing and Validation: Cardano’s testnets (e.g., preview, preprod) provide a sandbox for iterative testing of the smart contract and dApp, ensuring functionality and security before mainnet deployment. Tools like the Plutus Playground and Demeter will streamline development and testing, enabling rapid iteration within the PoC timeline.
Scalability: Cardano’s layered architecture (Settlement and Computation Layers) supports efficient transaction processing, making the dApp scalable for thousands of users. The project’s initial focus on Ghana’s 500 cooperative societies ensures a manageable scope for the PoC, with potential for regional expansion.
Operational Feasibility
The project’s operational feasibility is grounded in its alignment with Africa’s existing cooperative systems and a bottom-up approach:
Cultural Alignment: The Ubuntu dApp builds on traditional cooperative models, where groups pool resources without collateral, as practiced by 14 million members in Kenya, 132,000 cooperatives in South Africa, and 15,000 in Ghana. This cultural fit ensures user acceptance, as the dApp mirrors familiar practices while enhancing them with blockchain transparency and security.
Bottom-Up Approach: By engaging local cooperatives in Ghana through workshops and partnerships, the project fosters grassroots adoption and ownership. Community-driven onboarding ensures the dApp meets user needs, such as simple interfaces for non-technical users and low-cost credit at <2% interest.
Market Demand: Research highlights the informal sector’s need for accessible credit, with doubled credit flow potentially increasing GDP by 2% (Caprio and Honohan, 2001). Documentation barriers and high interest rates (20%) exclude informal businesses from formal finance (World Bank, 2008). The Ubuntu dApp addresses these barriers by offering collateral-free loans and on-chain credit profiles, aligning with the borrowing patterns of Ghanaian SMEs, where loan sizes correlate with monthly cash flow (Domeher et al., 2014).
Pilot Scope: The initial rollout in Ghana, targeting 500 cooperative societies, is achievable within the PoC timeframe. A phased approach—starting with a small cohort of cooperatives—ensures operational manageability, with lessons learned informing scalability.
Risk Mitigation: Potential risks, such as user adoption or technical complexity, are addressed through:User Training: Workshops and localized support will onboard non-technical users, ensuring accessibility.
Technical Redundancy and Security: Multiple wallet integrations (e.g., Nami, Eternl) and backup APIs (e.g., Koios, Blockfrost) mitigate dependency risks. Additionally, preliminary audits by Inversion will address smart contract vulnerabilities, ensuring user trust.
The project’s reliance on Cardano’s open-source ecosystem and Inversion’s expertise ensures technical feasibility, while the bottom-up approach and cultural alignment guarantee operational viability for the PoC.
Team Capability
The project is lead by Ubuntu Origin Labs an organization with mission to provide decentralized solutions for critical challenges faced by the informal sector and in Africa by leveraging on Cardano blockchain technology for development, supported by Inversion, possesses the expertise, experience, and resources to deliver the Ubuntu dApp PoC. Key capabilities include:
Inversion’s Technical Expertise:
Cardano Development: Inversion (https://inversion.dev/#aboutus)))) specializes in Cardano dApp development, with proficiency in Plutus and Haskell for smart contract creation. Their experience with Cardano’s EUTxO model ensures robust, secure contract logic for cooperative credit systems.
dApp Development: Inversion has the skills to build user-friendly frontends and backend logic, integrating with Cardano wallets via CIP-30 standards. Their familiarity with tools like Lucid, Mesh.js, and Demeter streamlines development and testing.
Security and Testing: Inversion’s expertise includes conducting security audits and leveraging Cardano testnets, ensuring the dApp is reliable and secure. Their use of Docker and Plutus Playground enhances development efficiency.
Track Record: While specific past projects are not detailed, Inversion’s focus on Cardano development, as indicated on their website, positions them as a capable partner for delivering the PoC within the project timeline.
Project Management and Local Expertise:
Core Team: The project includes a multidisciplinary team with experience in blockchain project management, financial inclusion, and African cooperative systems. Team members have backgrounds in community engagement and SME finance, ensuring effective stakeholder coordination in Ghana.
Local Partnerships: Collaborations with Ghanaian cooperative networks and local NGOs will facilitate user onboarding and feedback collection, leveraging existing trust networks to drive adoption.
Community Engagement: The team will engage the Cardano developer community via the Cardano Forum and Stack Exchange, ensuring alignment with ecosystem standards and access to technical support.
Milestone Title
Project Planning and Smart Contract Development
Milestone Outputs
A comprehensive project plan, including requirements specification, and a fully coded Plutus-based cooperative smart contract. The contract will encode group formation (3, 5, or 7 members), contribution tracking, fund disbursement, repayment management with <2% interest, and governance mechanics for dispute resolution. A technical specification document will detail the contract’s logic, EUTxO transaction flows, and integration requirements. Initial community engagement will begin to align the project with cooperative needs in Ghana.
Acceptance Criteria
Evidence of Completion
Delivery Month
3
Cost
20650
Progress
20 %
Milestone Title
dApp Frontend and Backend Development
Milestone Outputs
A functional dApp prototype with a user-friendly frontend, backend, and integrated Atala Prism system for identity management. The frontend will enable cooperative members to form groups, contribute to credit pools, request loans, and track repayments via Cardano wallets. The backend, built using the Plutus Application Framework (PAF), will handle transaction construction and blockchain integration. Atala Prism will support on-chain identity and credit profile creation. Wireframes and UI/UX designs will ensure accessibility for non-technical users.
Acceptance Criteria
Evidence of Completion
Delivery Month
3
Cost
35765
Progress
40 %
Milestone Title
Testing, Security Audit, and Community Engagement
Milestone Outputs
A tested and audited Ubuntu dApp prototype, refined based on feedback from Ghanaian cooperatives and the Cardano developer community. Comprehensive testing will validate functionality, performance, and user experience. A security audit by Inversion will ensure the smart contract and dApp are free of critical vulnerabilities. A community workshop in Ghana and engagement with Cardano’s developer ecosystem will gather feedback to enhance usability and align with cooperative needs.
Acceptance Criteria
Evidence of Completion
Delivery Month
2
Cost
22590
Progress
20 %
Milestone Title
Pilot Deployment and PoC Validation with Ghanaian Cooperatives
Milestone Outputs
A pilot deployment of the Ubuntu dApp with 50–100 users from 20–30 cooperative groups in Ghana, validating the PoC in a real-world setting. The pilot will test group formation, credit pool contributions, loan disbursements, and repayments at <2% interest, while collecting user feedback. A final PoC report will document outcomes, user satisfaction, and scalability recommendations. Marketing efforts will raise awareness, and legal registration will be finalized to support pilot operations.
Acceptance Criteria
Evidence of Completion
Delivery Month
1
Cost
20917
Progress
20 %
Please provide a cost breakdown of the proposed work and resources
Budget Total: 99,922 ADA
Milestone 1 – Project Planning and Smart Contract Development (20,650 ADA)
Planning and Gathering Requirements (4,250 ADA)
Back-end Development – Smart Contract (10,000 ADA)
Legal Registration – Initial Setup (2,000 ADA)
Product Management – Planning Oversight (2,000 ADA)
Team Fees – Development and Management (2,400 ADA)
Milestone 2 – dApp Frontend and Backend Development (35,765 ADA)
UI Design (10,215 ADA)
Frontend Development and Research (20,550 ADA)
Backend Development – Atala Prism (4,000 ADA)
Team Fees – UI/UX and Development (1,000 ADA)
Milestone 3 – Testing, Security Audit & Community Engagement (22,590 ADA)
Testing & QA (5,000 ADA)
Backend Development – Remaining Atala Prism and DB (3,900 ADA)
Informal Sector Education and Workshop – Initial (9,090 ADA)
Product Management – Testing Oversight (2,000 ADA)
Team Fees – Testing & Engagement (1,600 ADA)
Milestone 4 – Pilot Deployment and PoC Validation (20,917 ADA)
Smart Contract Deployment and Launch (5,000 ADA)
Backend Development – Remaining DB Setup (2,500 ADA)
Informal Sector Education and Workshop – Pilot (3,000 ADA)
Marketing and Advertising (8,000 ADA)
Legal Registration – Compliance (2,000 ADA)
Product Management – Pilot Oversight (1,000 ADA)
Team Fees – Pilot and Marketing (417 ADA)
How does the cost of the project represent value for the Cardano ecosystem?
The project idea of empowering SMEs with cooperative lending groups on Cardano blockchain, providing fair & transparent access to funding, catalyzing economic growth offers the Cardano ecosystem substantial value for money in the following ways:
I confirm that evidence of prior research, whitepaper, design, or proof-of-concept is provided.
Yes
I confirm that the proposal includes ecosystem research and uses the findings to either (a) justify its uniqueness over existing solutions or (b) demonstrate the value of its novel approach.
Yes
I confirm that the proposal demonstrates technical capability via verifiable in-house talent or a confirmed development partner (GitHub, LinkedIn, portfolio, etc.)
Yes
I confirm that the proposer and all team members are in good standing with prior Catalyst projects.
Yes
I confirm that the proposal clearly defines the problem and the value of the on-chain utility.
Yes
I confirm that the primary goal of the proposal is a working prototype deployed on at least a Cardano testnet.
Yes
I confirm that the proposal outlines a credible and clear technical plan and architecture.
Yes
I confirm that the budget and timeline (≤ 12 months) are realistic for the proposed work.
Yes
I confirm that the proposal includes a community engagement and feedback plan to amplify prototype adoption with the Cardano ecosystem.
Yes
I confirm that the budget is for future development only; excludes retroactive funding, incentives, giveaways, re-granting, or sub-treasuries.
Yes
I Agree
Yes
Nathaniel Dwamena - Project Manager/ Research Lead
He is a respected free-market policy analyst in Ghana. He is a blockchain enthusiast and founded the African Institute for Defi and Blockchain (AIDBLOCK) and CEO for Ubuntu Origin Labs (UOLABS). His work promotes free enterprise, civil liberty, prosperity, digital inclusion, financial freedom, and he has conducted significant blockchain research. He recently co-authored a policy paper titled, “Navigating Cryptocurrencies and CBDCs in the Landscape of Monetary Sovereignty and Economic Freedom”. He is a distinguished speaker and research and has played a pivotal role in nurturing blockchain entrepreneurs and educating Ghanaian youths as well as individuals in francophone communities in Ghana through the Working with Web3 initiative. He also educates individuals on liquid democracy and DRep awareness in Ghana. Additional, he undertake blockchain solution consultion for businesses and enterprise in Ghana and has been actively participating in project catalyst since Fund 7.
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nathaniel-dwamena-02578a127/
Kingsley Mensah - dApp Developer
He holds an MSc. in Computer Science and Technology. Founder of a web hosting company, Kingscel Technologies. He has proven skills in web designing, software development, computer networking and security, Javascript, Plutus, and CSS, and loves ideas for a free society. He is a front-end and back-end developer. He was awarded the Star of Innovation Award in 2019 by the Hubei University of Technology (China). He also received the Young Achievers Award at the Pride of Africa Awards (Asia) 2020 by Appreciate Africa Network (Asia).
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/kingsley-mensah/
Angela Okai-Nartey - Cooperative Partnership Lead
She is the founder and executive director of the Ladies Network for Economic Freedom, an organization dedicated to empowering women through financial literacy and economic opportunities. As a Google-certified digital marketer and a research analyst with a deep focus on blockchain technology, she has been actively involved in the Cardano ecosystem since Fund 7. Angela leverages her research expertise to drive innovative solutions in decentralized finance (DeFi), promoting inclusive growth and the transformative potential of blockchain in financial systems. Her leadership continues to advance women’s economic empowerment in the digital age.
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/angela-okai-nartey-8b8aa81b2/
Bright Agyemang - Financial Analyst
He is a Certified Financial Modeling and Valuation Analyst (FMVA), and Business Intelligence and Data Analyst (BIDA). He serves as Programs Director/Policy Analyst for the DIY Network where he applies data and policy to enhance sustainability and social impact.