NYOTA (NYT), a community inclusion currency for Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, is planned to launch on the Encointer mainnet this September.
Encointer is delighted to announce the launch of the fourth community currency for Dar es Salaam, Tanzania this September. The launch of NYOTA (NYT) follows a successful effort on behalf of the local team – Bujo, Victor, Teresia, and David – who have been in close contact with the Encointer team since the Dot Safari Conference in Kenya earlier this year.
Together, these innovators are driven by their shared vision of creating value by bringing new technologies to their communities. They have worked as a team to develop NYOTA through numerous iterations in order to reach an optimal value proposition for NYOTA as a community currency.
“Nyota” is a Swahili word meaning “star,” and the team chose the name to convey the idea of a currency that brings positivity to people, uniting them in the shared hope of a brighter future.
One of the biggest challenges facing new Encointer currencies is the need to adapt to local circumstances, which is necessary to achieve a virtuous cycle where recognition of the value of the currency supports growing adoption. The Nyota team is leveraging the established structures of local so-called “Village Community Banks” (VICOBAs). VICOBAs are a micro-financing scheme comparable to a credit union, where local participants can combine their savings into community pools that can be used for extending lines of credit.
VICOBA networks already operate based on in-person meetups, and the concept is familiar to local residents, making it an ideal mechanism to create a soft landing for NYOTA participation with regular proof-of-personhood gatherings.
The idea is to peg Nyota to the value of the Tanzanian shilling, where one NYT is equal to the value of one thousand Tanzanian shillings. The initial allowance is still being discussed. The current state is to set to 50 NYT per participant and month.
The team will use three pillars to engage the local community:
Educational programs consisting of workshops, webinars, and tutorials to propagate the knowledge of Encointer among local residents.
Human-centric activities, such as networking events and meetups, to get people talking about Encointer and its real-world use cases, with a view to building a volunteer program.
Adoption, focusing on merchant engagement and the development of pilot programs.
To support the team in launching NYOTA and spreading the message of how it benefits the local community, the Encointer introduction video will also be translated into Swahili.
After several weeks of successful testing on the Encointer Gsell testnet, the team is now preparing an ambitious roadmap to launch NYOTA on mainnet by end of September.
We at Encointer are proud of the efforts to bring digital community currencies to life in Dar es Salaam and trust that the team there will continue their efforts to make the launch of NYOTA a success.
If you are interested in joining the NYOTA-Community, please get in touch with team on twitter or reach out to us!
