Arun Maharajan is blockchain lead at UNICEF's Office of Innovation in Stockholm. Ten years of blockchain work at the agency has so far been mostly financial — among it the UNICEF Crypto Fund, which since 2019 has received and paid out in cryptocurrencies and stablecoins without converting to fiat.

What he brings to the Blockathon in Stockholm is deliberately not financial, and deliberately narrow. UNICEF builds toilets, installs solar panels in schools and runs vaccination drives, mostly in places that are hard to reach and hard to document. Could citizens in those communities submit the proof themselves — a photo, a video, a GPS point — in a way that can be trusted, timestamped so it cannot be altered afterwards, attested by neighbours, and without the identity of the person who sent it ever becoming known?

The constraints matter as much as the idea: unreliable or absent connectivity, users whose digital experience may stop at WhatsApp, and a strong preference for open source. He is also on the jury, and says what he starts from — does this actually need a blockchain at all, and does it help anyone.

Recorded with Morten Myrstad at one of Kaupr's three virtual pre-events ahead of FirstBlock-athon, the hackathon week in Stockholm 7–11 September. Fourteen minutes.