Bitcoin certainly seems to offer something positive in societies scarred by autocracy,
colonialism, military coups, and woeful governance, as seen with those computers in a concrete
shed in rural Malawi turning water into streams of cash to fund electricity.
Greetings and salutations, my fellow plebs. My name is Walker and this is The Bitcoin Podcast.
The Bitcoin Block Height is 824773 and the value of one Bitcoin is still one Bitcoin.
Today's episode is Bitcoin Out Loud, where I read a Bitcoin or Bitcoin adjacent piece
of writing out loud. Today, I'm reading The African Village Mining Bitcoin by Ian Burrell.
This is a great piece to send your friends and family who still just think Bitcoin is
some magic internet money Ponzi scheme Americans can use to get rich, or who think Bitcoin
and crypto are the same, or who think Bitcoin is only used by criminals. The narrative around
Bitcoin and Bitcoin mining is shifting, and those in the so-called mainstream are starting
to realize what Bitcoiners have been saying for years about the benefits of Bitcoin and
Bitcoin mining. It's not just techno babble, it's real, it's happening, and it's incredible.
Before we get started, I want to remind you that the Bitcoin halving is just a few months
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Without further ado, let's get into this Bitcoin out loud read.
The African Village Mining Bitcoin. The cryptocurrency can be a liberating force. By Ian Burrell,
Bondo is a scattered cluster of villages in a remote region of Malawi, near the border
with Mozambique. It sits in the foothills of Mount Mulanje, where residents rely on
their feet for transport and a few crops to feed their families. Yet, unlike in most places
in this impoverished country, when night descends, they can now switch on the lights, stoves,
and televisions in their homes. For electricity has arrived in Bondo. Three turbines were
installed in a microhydro scheme exploiting the fertile region's rainfall. And the impact
has been life-changing for the 1,800 homes so far connected to a mini-grid. Children
can study after dark, so now have a better chance of passing the exams for secondary
school rather than having to leave aged 11. Drugs and food can be stored in fridges, so
villagers do not have to make the 12-mile trek to the hospital and can produce batches
of food or drinks to sell at market. Cooking the evening meal is three times quicker and
far less destructive to the environment, without the need to collect firewood. One group of
women giggled when I asked them if they had televisions and watched football in their
homes. Before, our husbands would say they were going off to watch football, when they
were really walking out with other women. Now they can no longer claim they are going
off for football, Bertha told me. The senior chief told me they had never dreamed of having
energy supplied to the villages, with a dozen maize mills, many small enterprises, schools,
shops, and churches also connected to the grid. When you move around Bondo, you see
happy people, and that's because of electricity. Yet the big surprise in Bondo is not simply
the supply of energy to such an isolated community, in a country where only one in eight citizens
has access to great electricity, and on a continent where almost half the 1.2 billion
population still lack this life-changing supply. The real eye-opener is the stack of 32 computers
inside the concrete pump shed. This innovative mini-grid, located more than two hours from
Malawi's second city of Blanthier, along bumpy roads and tracks that can become impassable
in a torrential downpour, is mining bitcoin to fund its operation. It is a smart idea
the computers use to create valuable new bitcoin tokens and validate transactions, consume
around the same amount of energy as a medium-sized country such as Sweden would generate. Hence,
the stinging critique of how this cryptocurrency wastes the planet's precious resources.
This initiative flips that narrative by using bitcoin mining to fund energy in parts of
Africa that are too poor or too remote to merit connection to grids, but which do have
plentiful supplies of potential power sources. Mining soaks up the excess energy of these
renewable plants, and this delivers not just electricity, but a powerful jolt to drive
development in the local economy. The concept comes from a Kenyan firm, Gridless, set up
in 2022, whose backers include Twitter founder Jack Dorsey. There are four other sites in
Kenya, Zambia, and plans for scores more across the continent. Its aim is to demonstrate how
Africa could play a central role in countering the conventional belief that bitcoin, now
15 years old, is used simply for risky speculation and dodgy transactions. Instead, it backs
those who claim it will lead to more inclusive financial systems, as it usurps the control
of dysfunctional governments and manipulative central banks. It will also release the community
from reliance on foreign handouts to survive. The Bondo power plants were built by Mount
Melange Conservation Trust, a local group trying to protect the mountain region's unique
biodiversity, and were initially supported by finance from aid and development agencies.
But now bitcoin covers the running costs. This offers a commercial incentive that does
not rely on altruism or subsidies to deliver power to remote regions, while exploiting
energy waste at times of low use such as overnight. Malawi, one of the world's poorest
nations, provides a powerful case study in the failures of aid. As former development
minister Rory Stewart said in a lecture at Yale, Britain gave 4.5 billion pounds over
half a century to this southern African country, corroded by corruption and bad governance.
Yet it ended up, quote, if anything, poorer than when it was when we started. Bitcoin
can prevent Bondo from becoming the sort of white elephant that you see across Africa,
built by aid groups and then abandoned, said Eric Hursman, chief executive of Gridless.
He admits that he is not a big fan of the sector. They come in with low-cost loans and
grants to finance all these schemes that they say will pay their way in 30 years, but the
sums never add up. This is a new way to finance development. Malawi also demonstrates another
reason why there is rising interest in Bitcoin in Africa. People are seeking a safer home
for their cash than local currencies. Prices rose sharply after its currency was devalued
two months ago by 44% against the US dollar, the second decrease in value of the Quacha
in 18 months. Many African countries on the continent have suffered also from catastrophic
inflation, while official currency conversion rates can be significantly lower than street
rates. One Kenyan entrepreneur told me she turned to the cryptocurrency after seeing
her savings constantly eroded, even in a country with lower than average inflation for the
continent. I was trying to save to buy a house, but kept finding my sums declining. I wanted
more stability, so tried Bitcoin, and then found it at other uses. Said Marcel Lorraine,
founder of Bitcoin Data. Her clients include a trader of alternative health products in
a Nairobi street market, who found it much cheaper to use than changing currencies after
being introduced to it by a Nigerian customer, and is now hoping it will provide a stable
platform for building her business to obtain a shop. While Warren Buffett dismissed Bitcoin
as, probably rat poison squared, and the economist Paul Krugman has compared it to a Ponzi scam
fueled by libertarian fantasies and techno babble, devotees see it as a liberating force
due to the decentralized design created by its mysterious and pseudonymous creator Satoshi
Nakamoto. BlackRock, the world's biggest asset manager, has even applied to launch
a Bitcoin exchange traded fund that may open up the market to the US wealth management
industry. Certainly Bitcoin, for all its fluctuations, can seem comparatively reliable if you live
in Africa, or indeed many other parts of the planet, from Argentina to Lebanon.
This is what I've seen everywhere, said Peter McCormack, who travels the world for a Bitcoin
podcast. Here is an alternative to gold and property for a middle class that has some
money and patience, but is seeing expenses and costs rise, while savings decline in
value. And a strong middle class helps build a strong economy by driving consumer spending,
reducing reliance on the state, and driving innovation and entrepreneurship. Side note
to Peter, sorry that was probably a pretty bad impression, I'll work on getting that
better next time. Bitcoin has also become a helpful tool for activists and journalists
in dictatorships, since it makes it harder to track funds. In Togo, a West African state
run by one despotic family since 1967, it is used to channel cash to opposition and
civil society leaders, despite the freezing of bank accounts. Bitcoin has been instrumental
in delivering donations to Alexei Navalny's Anti-Corruption Foundation in Russia, and
the pro-democracy movements in Belarus and Myanmar. Alex Gladstein, Chief Strategy Officer
for the Human Rights Foundation, and author of a book arguing that Bitcoin offers freedoms
from archaic monetary systems and political strife, believes the cryptocurrency is especially
exciting for Africans, since they suffer, quote, all kinds of financial repression.
He points out there are 45 currencies on the continent, with 15 still controlled by France,
with high transaction fees on conversion deals that are largely processed by Western firms,
with heavily fluctuating rates. Bitcoin provides an escape and an alternative for Africans,
while its use is less limited than some people think, he says. Entrepreneurs there have figured
out how people without the internet can use Bitcoin, which is frankly remarkable. This
agility is typical of the technological innovation exploding across Africa, driven by a young,
rapidly growing and increasingly well educated population. The beautiful thing about Bitcoin
is that it is a bottom up technology, and its adoption has been genuine at all levels,
said one key figure at the second African Bitcoin conference in Ghana at the end of last year.
Only time will tell if Satoshi's invention will turn out to be a bubble with bad consequences,
or as optimists believe, a driver of profound change in the world. The fraud conviction
of Sam Bankman Freed, who ran one of the world's biggest cryptocurrency exchanges and admission
of money laundering by the boss of another major exchange, has hurt the reputation of
cryptocurrencies for many in the West. But Bitcoin certainly seems to offer something
positive in societies scarred by autocracy, colonialism, military coups, and woeful governance,
as seen with those computers in a concrete shed in rural Malawi turning water into streams
of cash to fund electricity. And that's a wrap on this Bitcoin Out Loud episode of The
Bitcoin Podcast. If you are a Bitcoin only company interested in sponsoring another fucking
Bitcoin podcast, head to bitcoinpodcast.net. You can find me on Noster by going to primal.net
slash Walker. And if you want to follow the Bitcoin podcast on Twitter, go to At Walker
America or at Titcoin Podcast. You can also find the video version of this podcast at
youtube.com slash At Walker America or At Walker America on Rumble. Bitcoin is scarce.
There will only ever be 21 million. But Bitcoin podcasts are abundant. So thank you for spending
your scarce time to listen to another fucking Bitcoin podcast. Until next time, stay free.