The EIC (European Innovation Council) Prize on Blockchains for Social Good has reportedly awarded €5 million to six winners, who were selected based on their potential to produce scalable, “deployable” and “high-impact” blockchain or distributed ledger technology (DLT) solutions for addressing societal difficulties. As noted in the declaration, the winning solutions propose DLT applications for leading fair trade and promoting a circular economy, which intends to offer greater transparency in production processes and quality data. These blockchain-enabled applications also strive to improve accountability while assisting financial inclusion and renewable energy initiatives.

The stated goal of the EIC (European Innovation Council) Prize on Blockchains for Social Good was to recognize and help software developers and civil society look into the applications of DLT to address common social problems. The Prize intended to cover various areas like traceability and performing fair trade, supporting decentralized circular global economies, enabling financial inclusion, maintaining transparency in public processes, partaking in democratic decision-making processes, and the efficient management of public records.

The Prize intended to award €1 million to five innovative or high-potential blockchain projects (although then ended up handing out awards to six projects). Maria Gabriel, Commissioner for Innovation Research, Culture, Education and Youth stated in a statement, “The proposed solutions show how blockchain can create positive social change by supporting fair trade, increasing transparency in production processes and e-commerce and contributing to financial inclusion by exploring decentralized economic structures.”

Thierry Breton, Commissioner for the Internal Market, said in a statement, “Participation from 43 countries in the Prize on Blockchains for Social Good has shown us the potential to address local and global challenges with blockchain technology…Europe has to fully recognize and support European technological innovations to address both industrial and sustainability challenges.”

The “Quality content” winner was WordProof, which built the WordProof Timestamp Ecosystem. This technology can “prove authenticity” and “make information verifiable, which would ultimately lead to more trust in internet content.” The “Traceability & Fair Trade” winner was PPP, which built Proof Points to “enable businesses to prove their social impact across the supply chains behind their business and products.”