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Bank of China unveils new e-CNY smart contract test program for school education

The state-owned bank makes a move to further digitize the economy through integrating smart payments in education and extra-curricular activities

By Shashank Bhardwaj

Image: Shutterstock

A local news outlet has reported that the state-owned Bank of China unveiled a new program that aims to bridge primary school education with smart contracts. In a partnership with local education authorities and financial authorities, children residing in Chengdu, located in China’s Sichuan province, will now have the ability to enroll in after-school programs or extracurricular lessons using digital yuan central bank digital currency, or e-CNY. 

The pilot test would mean that parents can start off by paying a deposit to a private educational entity for some lessons after which a smart contract would be generated to bind each lesson on a pro-rata basis to the individual’s deposit. This would smoothen the process through automatically crediting back the e-CNY payment to their account if a child misses the lesson or activity. 

"The program seeks to explore the benefits brought forth by e-CNY smart contracts. One potential use case is replacing the role of regulatory authorities to monitor payment transactions between parents and private education entities. Another is improving transactions' liquidity via zero transaction fees embedded in the e-CNY design," the Bank of China explained in a statement. 

This is not the first time that the Bank of China introduced an e-CNY scheme since it had earlier created an airdrop program for Chongqing’s residents as an effort to reduce carbon emissions. Within that program, users on the receiving end of the airdrop could dispense their funds for sustainable activities such as scooter rides, recyclable shopping bags, tickets to public transport, etc. Today, over 4,567,000 merchants in China accept e-CNY as payment, making the country’s efforts to digitize the economy and encourage the emerging technologies like blockchain a considerable success. 

Shashank is the founder at yMedia. He ventured into crypto in 2013 and is an ETH maximalist. Twitter: @bhardwajshash

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