The IOTA Foundation, the German non-profit developing IOTA, the open-source distributed ledger protocol known for its Tangle innovation, have partnered with an operational arm of the United Nations (UN) known as UNOPS.

In a Tuesday press release (see: duplicate by UNOPS) published by Julie Maupin (Director of Social Impact & Public Regulatory Affairs, IOTA Foundation), it was announced that “the two organizations have partnered to explore how IOTA’s innovative technology…can increase the efficiency of UNOPS operations.”

Notably, Dominik Schiener (Co-Founder, IOTA Foundation) presented at the UN’s Partnership for Technology in Peacekeeping Symposium last week, perhaps prompting Tuesday’s announcement.

How Can IOTA Help?

Having signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU), IOTA’s official statement explained how the applicability of their unique Tangle distributed ledger (powered by a quantum-proof directed acyclic graph (DAG), as opposed to a blockchain) “can provide a greater level of efficiency in the management and tracking of UN documents, supply chains and transactional payments in real-time, with access available to both UNOPS and its partners.”

The IOTA Foundation is fully committed to putting the IOTA Tangle to work on behalf of important humanitarian and development causes.” – Dominik Schiener

Beyond this, the MoU will allow for other means of cooperation between the IOTA Foundation and UNOPS, including training workshops, thought leadership-based seminars, and, notably, “the development of specific proof-of-concepts” for UNOPS; designed to introduce “greater efficiencies to specific areas of [their] work.”

More About UNOPS

Short for United Nations Office for Projects Services, UNOPS (headquartered in Denmark) serves the UN by implementing projects and innovative solutions on not just their behalf, but also for certain international financial institutions, governments and other affiliates located all over the world. The UN is currently comprised of 193 member states.

“Shared 🌍 problems require shared 🌍 solutions.” We’ve partnered w/ @iotatoken to explore how innovative data management tech can enhance the efficiency of humanitarian & development operations. | #distributedledger https://t.co/GHbbB2Pm9d — UNOPS (@UNOPS) May 22, 2018

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