By Eduard Peris i Deprez

In the so-called developed world, the blockchain ecosystem is, in general terms, fixated on the speculative nature of the crypto economy. But other societies are starting to explore ways in which blockchain technology may solve fundamental societal problems. At the same time, the emergence of DAOs as a new coordination paradigm matches with the atomized structure of the emerging services economy. Blockchain can facilitate digital identities, better value-chains and environmental traceability, reduce the possibility of fraudulent elections, tackle corruption and provide better documentation to safekeeping land titles or medical records.

However, the number of proven use cases is still embryonic as the public generally perceives blockchain technology as overly complex. For it to go mainstream, blockchain technology needs to solve real problems through strategic, concrete and measurable initiatives. For example, while Harmony provides millions of dollars in grants to scale thousands of developers, the vast majority do not come from Africa.

Harmony’s Africa DAO seeks to put a remedy to this. Harmony’s Africa DAO mandate is to organically reinforce the Harmony African ecosystem, making it a key player on the African continent. Over time, the Harmony Africa DAO could even become redundant, having given way to multiple self-sustainable DAOs over Africa. In other words, Harmony’s Africa DAO will boost Harmony’s African ecosystem as it reaches cruising altitude.

To accomplish our mandate, Harmony Africa will conduct a series of intertwined activities, all geared at accomplishing its following mission.

https://twitter.com/OneAfricaDao/status/1463607632359563267?s=20


1. Education

The first and main objective is to the technical understanding of Harmony among African developers. Due to Africa’s wide diversity of development stages, our activities will always span over a minimum of three countries to ensure the best possible exchange of knowledge. We believe the transfer of intra-African knowledge provides value for all.

Technical and non-technical training

The training will target advanced web2 developers who still do not use blockchain professionally, even if they are familiar with the technical concepts. The focus of the sessions will be to introduce them to the technology, including Harmony protocol. We intend to deliver these in person whenever possible and by a senior developer. At the end of the sessions, participants should be fluent enough to build on Harmony.

Training metrics: 1) Number of participants who complete the training, including a final evaluation. 2) Number of grant applications coming from African countries supported by the Africa DAO. 3) Number of projects developed with Harmony.

However, while technical training represents a push factor in growing the ecosystems, a pull factor also needs to exist. In this sense, we anticipate organising more business-oriented training that targets business incubators and schools. In Uganda’s top tech incubator, only one incubated project relates to blockchain. There is room to change this by providing more general courses/talks in incubators, business schools, etc.

Meetups for the tech community

Meetups are fundamental to promote both Harmony’s spirit and understanding. We intend to organise a minimum of one monthly meet-up in each country. As the community grows, we will hold them in different cities.

Meetups for the tech community metrics: 1) Increased engagement with Harmony’s site from Africa. 2) Number of participants and the diversity of their background sectors, as well as their seniority positions.

https://twitter.com/OneAfricaDao/status/1467170172083519493?s=20


2. Public influence