Farmer Connect Uses IBM Blockchain to Bridge the Gap Between Consumers and Smallholder Coffee Farmers

At the 2020 Consumer Electronics Show (CES), Farmer Connect and IBM (NYSE: IBM) today announced a new consumer mobile application called "Thank My Farmer," which will allow coffee drinkers to trace their coffee to understand its quality and origin, and even support the farmer who grew the beans. Developed with leading companies across the global supply chain including Beyers Koffie, The Colombian Coffee Growers Federation (FNC), ITOCHU Corporation, Jacobs Douwe Egberts (JDE), The J.M. Smucker Company, Rabobank, RGC Coffee, Volcafe, Sucafina and Yara International, Farmer Connect is a traceability platform powered by IBM Blockchain designed to help increase traceability, efficiency and fairness in the coffee supply chain.

China's first blockchain-based unsecured loan granted on OneConnect financing platform

On January 2, 2020, a financing platform for SMEs in China's Guangdong province was formally launched. The platform is supported by OneConnect (NYSE: OCFT), a leading Chinese fintech company that has just been listed on the New York Stock Exchange. The launch of the platform with blockchain as its key underlying technology marks the deep integration of digital government and fintech, signaling that difficulties in obtaining financing, including the associated high cost and slow pace of completing the process, faced by small and medium-sized businesses can be solved by following the "Guangdong model".