The UNDP Alternative Finance Lab (AltFinLab), Blockchain for Good Alliance, and EMURGO Labs launched Cohort 1 of the SDG Blockchain Accelerator – a transformative initiative designed to fast-track blockchain innovations that directly address development challenges aligned with the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The selected challenge owners and solution makers represent a surge of creativity, backed by technical rigor and real-world applicability, and span critical areas such as digital identity, humanitarian aid, climate action, and supply chain transparency.
What makes this accelerator truly unique is its collaborative structure. Each team brings together a UNDP Challenge Owner, grounded in frontline development realities, and a Solution Maker, armed with frontier blockchain expertise and ready-to-scale solutions. Over the next three months, 13 paired teams in Cohort 1 will co-design, prototype, and test blockchain applications that deliver real impact, accountability, and inclusion.
| UNDP Challenge Owner | Solution Maker |
|---|---|
| UNDP Tanzania – Track climate finance, carbon credits and biodiversity in Tanzania’s net-zero project, while ensuring inclusive participation of local communities, especially women and young people. | Thallo – A climate-tech platform that leverages blockchain to transparently track, verify, and trade carbon credits and sustainability assets. |
| UNDP Burkina Faso – Secure funding for Burkina Faso’s reforestation: global and local accountability, long-term. Traditional funding is often opaque, making it hard to keep planting and maintaining trees. | Atlas Ledger – Provides blockchain-based infrastructure for tracking environmental assets and climate finance, ensuring transparent reporting and long-term engagement. |
| UNDP Mauritius & Seychelles – Respond to high electricity costs & limited access to solar-energy due to high upfront costs, making solar financing transparent, inclusive and scalable by offering a crowdfunding platform. | Socious Fund – A decentralized platform for impact investing and crowdfunding that brings together social entrepreneurs and funders through smart governance and traceable digital payments. |
| UNDP Malawi – Weak transparency and beneficiary verification in humanitarian aid delivery, especially in remote, disaster-prone areas, causing delays and fund mismanagement. | ClimateAid (Genius Tags) – Uses real-time data, AI prediction models, and smart contracts to enable proactive humanitarian responses before climate disasters strike. |
| UNDP Tanzania – Frequent energy theft, poor billing transparency, and limited integration of renewable energy into national utility systems. | Grinplus – A blockchain-powered energy trading platform that connects local solar producers to markets via traceable, tamper-proof digital certificates. |
| UNDP India – Textile wastewater treatment plants lack financial sustainability, resulting in environmental violations and missed opportunities to monetize pollution reduction. | Karbon Ledger – Tracks emissions reduction and links pollution data to carbon markets, turning environmental compliance into economic incentives. |
| UNDP Malaysia – Inefficiencies and fraud in agricultural supply chains make it difficult for small farmers to prove carbon farming practices and access fair markets. | AFRIKABAL – Offers blockchain-based traceability for agri products and carbon farming practices, supporting fair pricing and environmental validation. |
| UNDP Bangladesh – Existing fund disbursement mechanisms are opaque and slow, with no reliable system to track local climate adaptation beneficiaries. | Cladfy – Delivers decentralized digital identity, e-wallets, and smart contract functionality to increase transparency in fund flows and program implementation. |
| UNDP Bangladesh – Opaque supply chains in Bangladesh raise trade costs, enable illicit activity, and hurt competitiveness. Small farmers, public projects, and the RMG sector all suffer. | Palmyra Pro (zenGate Global) – Specializes in decentralized data infrastructure to enhance transparency and compliance in global agri-supply chains. |
| UNDP Georgia – The municipality of Zugdidi struggles with e-waste due to inadequate systems, high costs, and public mistrust, leading to growing environmental risks. | Creative Operations – Designs market-based ventures that use utility tokens to incentivize social behaviors and address systemic community challenges. |
| UNDP Armenia – Weak waste sorting and recycling infrastructure reduces public engagement and fails to incentivize proper environmental behavior. | Plastiks (Nozama Tech) – Tracks plastic recovery and recycling via blockchain tokens, enabling waste traceability and community incentives. |
| UNDP Istanbul Regional Hub – Rising ethnic tensions in the Balkans and Central Asia are fueled by misinformation and untrusted systems, alongside opaque mineral supply chains that hinder economic independence. | BlackFrog (IotaOrigin UG) – a blockchain solution for supply chain traceability and climate action, tracking the provenance and sustainability of goods and materials. |
| UNDP Nordic Representation Office – Communities in fragile regions face high upfront costs for solar energy microgrids, while traditional financing models deter private investment. | Unicorn.eth – Combines verifiable digital identity with decentralized crowdfunding to expand access to renewable energy in underserved regions. |
To support their journey, the accelerator offers far more than technical validation. Backed by post-accelerator grant potential of up to USD $1.5 million, participants will receive intensive mentorship, access to a multi-chain development environment, expert-led workshops and entry points to the broader UN ecosystem. Through hands-on collaboration and technical deep dives, teams will sharpen their solutions and showcase them during a final pitch, setting the stage for pilot deployment and replication across other UNDP Country Offices.
Together, these 13 teams are forging a new path for how development problems are tackled. They signify a paradigm shift in the way we construct, expand and regulate solutions for sustainable development. Thanks to their expertise in humanitarian logistics, green finance, climate resilience and inclusive digital infrastructure, Cohort 1 is set to lay the groundwork for blockchain’s meaningful integration into the UN system. The grounding of these innovations is in lived realities, the informing of policy, and the designing of tangible, lasting benefits.
Ultimately, this cohort is a launchpad not only for individual teams, but also a signal to the wider development and blockchain communities that innovation cannot be confined to silos. By embracing agile, decentralised, and transparent tools within the UN system, we are redefining the way systems are built to serve people and the planet. We are here to set the standard for responsible blockchain innovation for the greater good.
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