Friends, I need some ideas.

I'm putting together a seminar to teach Haitian people about Bitcoin, which I hope to present in Haiti later this year.

Many people in Haiti receive remittances from friends and family in other countries. Western Union is the most common way to send money, but their fees are exorbitantly high. The local currency, the Haitian Gourde, is inflationary and has lost almost 50% of its value against the dollar in the past 12 months. Although many middle-class people are able to have a bank account, 2/3 of Haitian people are unbanked.

Bitcoin was made for places like Haiti, but it also presents some interesting challenges:

- Haiti is politically and economically unstable.

- Electrical service is notoriously unreliable.

- Internet is slow and unevenly distributed (though that might be changing thanks to Starlink).

- Common items like building material, electronics, and personal security are difficult to get or nonexistent.

It’s not going to work for everybody, but my goal is to help educate some people about Bitcoin so that they can begin using it to reduce the cost of remittances, provide financial services to the unbanked, and begin to promote a circular economy based on an alternative currency.

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Discussion

Imagine you're a middle-class Haitian family living in the city. You have a house, a stable income, and a small amount of money in the bank. Buying a safe to store your seed phrase would be prohibitively expensive, and there's no practical way to order steel plates, stampers, or most other Bitcoin security tools. Although you do have a smartphone, a hardware wallet is out of the question. Given these circumstances, how would you secure your Bitcoin?

I haven't learned much about fediment, but I think it was created to help solve this issue.

As far as orange pilling Haiti goes, godspeed to you. Seems like a worthwhile endeavour.

Personally my first thought would be to find influencial/connected locals and orange pill them first. That way you can learn some of the pitfalls for that particular country first before trying to work with a crowd.

This is a good plan. I’m hoping to arrive with some low-profile practical ideas though, so I don’t come in with a first-world “just buy a ColdCard” chip on my shoulder.

Absolutely. I think the accessability options are just starting to pick up.

It might be worthwhile talking to some of the bitcoiners in Nigera to see what's happening there.

Coldcard isn't really neccessary in my view until you get past 5M sats or so. (At current pricing) Most haitians I would imagine will have far less than that starting out.

I would love to talk to the Nigerians.

There was a dude on twitter running a profile called digioats I think. He was very nice. Also connected to some other Bitcoiners in Nigera

I spoke to Kal Kassa a while back. He is doing a project in Ethiopia. I intend to reconnect with him.

Imagine you're a poor person who lives in a hut in the country. You make a living by selling handmade items in the city. You have a little money saved but cannot open an account at the bank because you have no ID and no birth certificate. Your modest savings is stored in a box under your bed and is literally being eaten by moths and inflation. You have friends in the US who send a few hundred dollars a year via Western Union, which takes a big chunk of it. Your stateside friends would like to send you Bitcoin. You have a smartphone, but it only has a data signal when you go to the city. Buying a hardware wallet or spending money on any other type of equipment is out of the question. Given these circumstances, how would you secure your Bitcoin?