Browsing by Author "Harraway, Tricia Margaret"

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    Development of a peer-to-peer voucher donation management system enabled by blockchain
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2023-02) Harraway, Tricia Margaret; Bekker, James; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Engineering. Dept. of Industrial Engineering.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: In recent years charity and philanthropy sectors have experienced a surge in the availability of digital resources to aid in providing transparency in their operations and donation processing. There is no doubt that the world is transitioning into a digital space, where new solutions to existing problems could be approached with emerging technology. The Payments Association of South Africa (PASA) is aiming for a cashless society by 2030. Two frequently cited barriers to financial inclusion and bank account ownership is distrust in the system and lack of formal identification. As a result, FinTech companies are playing a larger role in providing innovative solutions for the undocumented and unbanked population, using technologies such as blockchain. Africa has a rich history of community philanthropy where horizontal giving is likely to be in the form of micro-donations such as cash, food or clothing. If fewer individuals rely on paper notes and coins, the concern is that those informal peer-to-peer donations will become less frequent and more challenging to make. Vouchers have been used in the past, in order to ensure donations are spent responsibly. In addition, e-vouchers provide higher levels of security, the possibility for different donation platforms to be digitally integrated and adapted, and as well as improved levels of engagement in the donation process. Programmable vouchers have all these benefits and also the potential to enable direct and customised donor-to-beneficiary charitable payments, without the need for trusted third party service providers. The potential for a digital, transparent peer-to-peer mechanism to donate vouchers in the form of blockchain tokens is presented. Blockchain technology enables distributed networks of trust, where instead of relying on a central entity, trust is shared among peers. Furthermore, the level of transparency presented by blockchain enables traceability of the movements of the donations. By disintermediating the process of supporting peers, providing transparency in resource allocation and increasing transaction efficiency, blockchain provides a use-case for decentralised, horizontal and direct ‘giving’. This research project explores the development of a digital voucher donation mechanism where the shortcomings of traditional voucher management systems, such as requiring a bank account or mobile device or needing formal identification on request, are challenged. To address these challenges and the need for financial inclusion, existing voucher transfer architectures and humanitarian information systems were consulted and a demonstrator was developed. A decentralised application with a front-end is designed and developed to interface with the smart contracts that hold the logic of the voucher donation management system. Vouchers are minted as tokens on the Polygon network to present scalability in the future. Traditionally the voucher transaction information was stored in a centralised database, instead they are transparently recorded on a distributed network. The blockchain acts as the back-end supporting the smart contract implementation which is deployed with predefined conditions mirroring traditional escrow services. Digital wallets are integrated, allowing beneficiaries to store and redeem their voucher tokens at participating vendors via a QR code public address. The smart contracts are verified and validated using various software tests, to ensure that their functionality fulfills the requirements of the research project. The evaluation of the demonstrator showed that blockchain technology, while still in its infancy, has the potential to empower the underserved, while providing full transparency for the stakeholders involved.