During the past year, several large institutions have begun lobbying for clearer regulations on the issue of blockchain as to further the adoption and development of the technology.

Yesterday potentially saw advancements being made in this area, as members from the US Congressional Blockchain Caucus met with IBM to discuss potential use cases for blockchain, within fields such as ID systems, supply chains, and payments.

This comes following IBM’s release of the report ”The Impact of Blockchain for Government: Insights on Identity, Payments and Supply Chain” which was created in cooperation with the US Congressional Blockchain Caucus.

In summary, the report touches on a myriad of blockchain-related matters within these fields, and it stems from a number of roundtable discussions between Jerry Cuomo, the CTO and Vice President for Blockchain Technology at IBM, Thomas Hardjono, the Technical Director at MIT, and the two US Representatives David Schweikert and Jared Polis.

More specifically, MIT and IBM had three meetings with congressional representatives, in which they conferred on the importance of government funding of blockchain ventures, as well as the need for so-called ”regulatory sandboxes” – which the state could use to trial new technologies before introducing these to the wider market.

In a press call following the latest meeting, Cuomo stressed that although experts could continue to study blockchain nearly indefinitely, the technology will need to become widely available for the general populace sooner or later.

He went on to note that it is ”time for the [US] to start acting” when it comes to developing blockchain innovation that can be used in daily life, before adding that ”blockchain is ready for government, let’s get government ready for blockchain”.

Furthermore, it would seem that the roundtable discussions were conducted by a set of people who are all open to blockchain technology.

Jared Polis has previously proposed turning the state of Colorado into a national center for ”blockchain innovation in business and government” – essentially using it as a testing ground for blockchain-based solutions.

Polis also noted that Colorado has only seen a sliver of the technology’s potential – although he also added that a legal framework for blockchain implementation and development is sorely needed.

Moreover, Polis also pointed to blockchain technology as a possible solution for the ”real lack of trust in centralized institutions” in the US. In addition to this, the group had discussed cryptocurrency taxation, and touched on several other blockchain-related topics.

Notably, this is the second news in less than a week from the Blockchain Caucus, following Congressman Tom Emmer’s introduction of three ”groundbreaking” cryptocurrency and blockchain-related bills.

Image Source: “Flickr”