TL;DR: We're committed to empowering underserved communities and environmental stewards through Web3-driven microfinance. Since 2021, impactMarket has positively impacted thousands of lives globally with initiatives like Microcredit, Learn-to-Earn, Unconditional Basic Income (UBI), and our crypto wallet, Libera. This impact extends beyond the social and economic realms, contributing also to the environment. Our primary goal is to broaden access to financial products and education while rewarding forest stewards for safeguarding crucial natural ecosystems vital for carbon capture.

Your support through donations is crucial to scaling these initiatives. These funds will enable us to further engage local communities, drive Web3 adoption, and initiate projects delivering blockchain-based financial services to both communities traditionally underserved by traditional finance and forest stewards working to protect our ecosystems.

Our story

impactMarket started as an Unconditional Basic Income (UBI) protocol to support underserved communities in developing countries.

Unlike other UBI projects, impactMarket is fully decentralized and community-owned. Both participants and owners can earn PACT tokens through various actions, giving them a voice in key decisions and a stake in the success of the project. This drove the adoption and retention of the protocol worldwide. We distributed over $3M to almost 50K beneficiaries from 25+ developing countries.

Discover one of impactMarket's UBI communities in Brazil

Recently, we unlocked access to Microcredit to communities in Uganda, Nigeria, Brazil, and Ghana through our community finance product. We have disbursed almost $150K through 450 loans.

Financial inclusion has no impact without financial education. We help users understand how to make the best of web3 through a Learn-to-Earn program that rewards users for taking courses on financial education and crypto concepts. The incentivized system was massively successful, with over 40K lessons completed so far in 2023. We are partnering with Opera as the first and only dAPP included in its wallet, MiniPay, at launch which is attracting thousands of new users daily.

In the following months, the focus will be on educating more people through our financial education platform, releasing new content, and growing the beneficiaries of our community finance products. Additionally, since a large part of our communities are rural farmers that are heavily impacted by climate change, we are also building a product to deliver forest stewards a Conservation Basic Income. In other words, paying them unconditionally for the environmental services that their land generates by capturing CO2 from the atmosphere.

The Conservation Basic Income is pivotal in combating climate change by economically empowering land stewards committed to preserving forests. By providing a reliable income, it addresses the economic pressures that often lead to deforestation. This initiative not only ensures financial stability for stewards but also strategically invests in environmental conservation. Recognizing the value of sustainable land management, the Conservation Basic Income aligns economic well-being with environmental protection, making it a crucial tool in the global effort to mitigate climate change and preserve vital ecosystems.

We are onboarding last-mile communities that have been underserved by both traditional finance and web3 solutions and keeping them engaged by delivering sticky value-added financial services. We’ve proven that the model works and our approach is crucial to bringing the next billion users onto Web3.

Success metrics of ImpactMarket:

• $3M USD distributed to almost 50K UBI beneficiaries from 25+ developing countries.
• $150K USD distributed through 450 loans in Uganda, Nigeria, Brazil, and Ghana.
• 40K+ lessons completed by the community to improve their financial education.

Problems that we are solving for financially underserved communities

1. Lack of information and financial education.
2. Lack of access to financial services.
3. High financial frictions, high risk of defaults, and low margins to make microfinance accessible.
4. Landowners are often pushed to sell forest land for agricultural purposes. Those who are stewarding for environmental services are not rewarded for their positive externalities, including slowing down Climate Change.

Our approach

1. Financial education through Learn-to-Earn programs
2. Unconditional Basic Income and Conservation Basic Income
3. Microcredit through community finance, leveraging local knowledge and aligning incentives between lenders and communities.

Join our mission

Through this Gitcoin grant, you can support the development of impactMarket’s solutions, with a focus on Conservation Basic Income while amplifying our educational efforts to engage and empower underserved communities worldwide.

We appreciate your consideration and contribution, which fuel our vision to make a lasting impact through web3 community finance.

You can find more key info about the project here: https://docsend.com/view/uzsjp3wxaj7hyndv