Natural disasters have catastrophic effects on impoverished people. Following the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, estimates of the proportion of people living below the poverty line in Aceh, Indonesia, shot up from 30 percent to 50 percent. Similarly, estimates are that more than 750,000 people fell into poverty because of the earthquake and aftershocks that hit Nepal in 2015. In New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina, governmental initiatives fell flat when disaster officials could not coordinate between federal agencies’ web of networks to deliver relief supplies promptly.
Significant challenges faced by organizations during disaster relief
Some of the most critical challenges faced by a company during relief efforts include:
- Lack of accountability, trust, and transparency of the relief efforts to ensure agencies could effectively utilize resources for the specific purpose.
- The lengthy and challenging process of registration for volunteers
- Lack of cooperation or coordination throughout companies
- Difficulty in collecting and distribution efforts that leads towards duplication of waste
- Incorrect recording of transactions and activities related with efforts related to relief management
Using blockchain to address disaster relief challenges
A blockchain solution is essential to address the challenges posed by disaster relief issues. Some of the proposed solutions are as follows:
- Decentralized platform: Blockchain provides coordination and collaboration for all associated stakeholders with a single and comprehensive trusted ledger.
- Data immutability: Agents cannot easily change data recorded on a blockchain, resulting in an audit trail and a trusted system for distributing and collecting different services and products.
- Demand reporting: Trusted participants could effectively record demands from various areas on a comprehensive network, avoiding wastage and duplication of any potential data.
- Transparent tracking: Supplies inventory could be tracked from receipt to the warehouses until delivered directly to the end consumer, improving accountability and facilitating logistics — thus leading to better and improved responses for disaster relief management.
Solutions provided by 5ireChain for disaster relief programs
From an organizational point of view, 5ireChain provides highly relevant solutions throughout environmental applications. It focuses on delivering the transition to clean and highly efficient decentralized systems, peer-to-peer trading of permits and resources, supply-chain management and transparency, and the latest financing models for environmental outcomes. Within the context of disaster relief programs, 5ireChain can provide various solutions for disaster relief. Some of the answers are as follows:
Automated preparation of disaster management and humanitarian relief: 5ireChain can help underpin a new and shared system for various parties involved in disaster preparedness and provide relief for improved effectiveness, efficiency, coordination, and trust of resources. An interoperable decentralized system also allows data sharing and automated transactions by providing smart contracts, improving the efficiency of the consequences of disasters.
Next-gen sustainability reporting, monitoring, and verification: 5ireChain also has the potential for transforming both sustainability reporting and assurance, allowing companies to manage, demonstrate and improve their performance and supporting consumers and investors in making better-informed decisions.
Transparent supply chain management: Along with providing economic sustainability, 5irechain can also help to improve the green supply chain. Moreover, 5ireChain can help to facilitate different means for green production. Apart from that, 5ireChain’s blockchain-based technology could also create unavoidable transparency for supply chains. Full product traceability is supported by recording transactional data across the supply chain on a blockchain and establishing an immutable provenance record.
Sustainable and decentralized resource management: 5ireChain could also help to underpin a transition to large-scale decentralized utility systems. These platforms could collate distributed data on resources to end the current asymmetry of existing data between different stakeholders and provide informed and decentralized decision-making for resource management and system design.
