Time has come to the new century, under the background of common prosperity and harmonious development between man and nature becoming a global consensus, more and more countries and organizations have begun to practice the concept of ESG (Environmental, Social and Corporate Governance). In China, the launch of national strategies such as rural revitalization, common prosperity, dual-carbon strategy, and digital economy also aims to promote the development model of "efficiency first" and shift to fair and sustainable development, and ESG practices are constantly emerging.
In the wave of industrial digitalization, technology is not only an important part of ESG sustainable development, but also one of the cornerstones supporting the implementation of ESG applications.
Taking blockchain technology as an example, as a trust-transmitting machine, it can enable the government, the public, enterprises and other parties in the ESG strategy to establish trust and consensus, and it is an indispensable technical base for the development of the digital economy. Therefore, the national "14th Five-Year Plan" digital economy development plan also clearly proposes to use blockchain as one of the advantageous technologies to be strengthened in the breakthrough project of digital technology innovation.
As early as 2015, WeBank began to explore the development and application of blockchain. The released "butterfly" flapped its wings, setting off an ESG storm at the moment. Recently, WeBank officially announced the launch of a new brand of "WeBank Blockchain". In the next stage, it will take building an ESG credible infrastructure as its new mission, through the construction of an ESG strategy involving the government, the public, and enterprises. Build a foundation of trust, accelerate industrial digitalization, and help sustainable development.
Taking the "butterfly storm" of Weizhong blockchain as an opportunity, we can look back at the past, present and future of blockchain and ESG.
In the past:
Use the prism of technology to refract the brilliance of ESG
After seven years of traveling, the Weizhong blockchain has supported the implementation of more than 200 industrial digital benchmarking applications. A series of technical practices are a model of technical support for ESG, like a prism, reflecting the practical significance of ESG strategy.
1. Trusted data and privacy protection, the cornerstone of trust in urban governance.
There are many roles involved in urban governance, and it is becoming more and more difficult to collect and use data in compliance. How to promote the application of ESG in urban governance puts forward high requirements for multi-party trust.
The Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, which is positioned as a world-class urban agglomeration, uses blockchain technology as the foundation of urban trust. WeZong blockchain takes the lead in setting an example, and supports cross-border data mutual recognition with blockchain open source technology.
During the epidemic prevention and control period, the personnel exchanges in the Greater Bay Area also brought unprecedented challenges to the social governance system. How to balance the epidemic prevention and control with normal flow? WeZong blockchain provides open source technical support to help Guangdong and Macao Institutions realize cross-border mutual recognition of health codes. The mutual recognition system uses the physical identity identification and verifiable digital certificate technology of the Weizhong blockchain, so that the institutions of the two places can still verify the authenticity and validity of the information even if the background is not connected. This not only protects the privacy of the people who come and goes, it will not cause security compliance issues in cross-border data transmission, but also allows the health code to gain mutual trust and mutual recognition. As of December 2021, the cumulative number of customs clearance personnel holding the health code customs clearance certificate exceeds 100 million person-times.
2. Credible collaboration and incentive mechanism to help green emission reduction and sustainable development.
Improving the enthusiasm of the public to participate in ESG governance is inseparable from an efficient, transparent, and credible incentive mechanism. The technical characteristics of blockchain multi-party consensus, credible verification, incentive compatibility, and full traceability just meet the needs of ESG applications.
Take the dual-carbon strategy as an example. In 2021, "carbon peaking" and "carbon neutrality" will be written into the "Government Work Report" for the first time. Green economy and ecological sustainable development have become the focus of national strategies. As early as June 2020, WeBank, together with Beijing Green Exchange and Beijing Lvpuhui Network Technology Co., Ltd., launched the first blockchain + green travel project "Green Travel Puhui Platform", using blockchain as a The support of the platform reward mechanism.
Through the application of blockchain technology, users are more motivated to record their personal emission reductions through the "Green Pratt & Whitney" applet, and get rewards for green energy and carbon points, which greatly improves the enthusiasm of citizens to participate in green environmental protection actions. As part of the low-carbon Winter Olympics, "Green Pratt & Whitney" also connected with the "Low-Carbon Winter Olympics" mini-program released by the Beijing Winter Olympics Organizing Committee in July 2020, encouraging every car owner to voluntarily stop driving and reduce costs for the Winter Olympics. Row.
Similar carbon inclusive practices have been implemented in Beijing, Luzhou, Suzhou and other cities. For example, the "Green Bud Points" jointly created with the Luzhou Municipal Government of Sichuan Province, and the "Digital Carbon Ledger" of Suzhou City, etc., continue to inspire the whole society The enthusiasm for participating in "carbon neutrality" has become a dazzling landscape in China's dual carbon strategy.
3. Industrial digital infrastructure to help high-quality rural development.
The "14th Five-Year Plan" period is the period for the development of the rural revitalization strategy, and it is also a critical period for narrowing the urban-rural gap. Among them, the digital transformation of agriculture is an important part of the development of rural industries.
In terms of rural revitalization, WeBank has established cooperation with core enterprises in feed, chemical fertilizer, agricultural machinery and other industries through blockchain and big data risk control methods to provide services for their upstream and downstream suppliers; based on the relationship between small and micro farmers and core enterprises Transaction records, tax records and other credible data provide credit loan services and support the development of rural financial services.
Its self-developed blockchain open source technology has supported the traceability of many agricultural products from all over the world, such as hairy crabs from Yangcheng Lake, Longjing from West Lake, capon from Hainan, and beef cattle from Inner Mongolia, comprehensively promoting the upgrading of terminal consumption and increasing the added value of agricultural products.
Qi Yingjie, chairman of Hangzhou West Lake Longjing Tea Co., Ltd., feels deeply about this. Known as the "Queen of Green Tea", West Lake Longjing tea is so scarce that most consumers can't tell the difference between Longjing tea and West Lake Longjing tea. How to build trust with consumers has always troubled Qi Yingjie. They cooperated with Wezhong blockchain to create a digital tea garden. Using the open source technology system provided by Wezhong blockchain, they took advantage of the characteristics of blockchain that cannot be tampered with, traceable, and verifiable. Process, packaging, logistics and other links are chained, and the West Lake Longjing "Digital Tribute Brand" blockchain traceability platform is built to realize the whole process traceability of tea from production to sales, so that consumers are most concerned about the place of origin, quality and other information. check.
The blockchain ESG application has effectively contributed to the development of the rural digital economy.
It is not difficult to find that in every case explored in the past, Weizhong blockchain promotes the application of more ESG, and provides a steady stream of technical power to promote fair and sustainable development.
this morning:
The Butterfly Changes and New Mission of Weizhong Blockchain
If Seven years ago, WeBank started blockchain research and released a "technical butterfly", then after seven years of butterfly transformation, this butterfly has flown across the vast sea and reached the eve of the storm of large-scale landing.
In the first two stages, WeZong blockchain has successively completed the missions and goals of "independent controllable technology and open source" and "industrial digitalization". With the acceleration of digital transformation and the rise of the ESG wave, the Weizhong blockchain has in fact become an important force in promoting fair and sustainable development.
As Fan Ruibin, deputy general manager of WeBank’s Distributed Business Technology Development Department and head of WeBank’s blockchain, said, using blockchain to optimize social governance requires three steps. The first step is to use open source technology to support partners to explore and implement in the ESG field; the second step is to refine benchmark applications to form general frameworks and solutions; the third step is to use open source ecology to make these cases and standards common The framework is passed on and shared to drive more forces to participate.
According to this roadmap, Weizhong blockchain has accumulated rich advantages in supporting ESG development from point to point——
·Anchor point of technology: focus on tackling key technologies, and use technological breakthroughs to support change and innovation. Since 2015, Weizhong Blockchain has continued to carry out core technology research, independently developed a set of full-stack technology systems covering the underlying layer, middleware, and application components, and fully open sourced them. The number of blockchain technology patent applications ranks among the top in the world.
Xiang Lipeng, head of the five blockchain institutes of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, said that the innovation of key blockchain technologies and the research on systematic attack and defense technologies have become one of the cores of competition between countries, and the Weizhong blockchain technology system has already It has become a typical case of continuous realization of independent and controllable blockchain in China, leading the direction for the development of blockchain technology in my country.
These key technologies have laid a solid technical foundation for multi-party collaborative ESG application exploration.
Application clues: Connecting ESG scenarios and technologies together forms an exploration mechanism for the linkage and co-construction of the two, accelerating the incubation of ESG applications. WeZong Blockchain focuses on the pain points of improving collaboration efficiency and reducing collaboration costs. At present, it has successfully explored in many fields such as finance, medical care, justice, agriculture, and manufacturing, and has accumulated more than 200 industrial digital benchmarking applications. This deep coupling of scenarios and technologies can truly penetrate the value needs of vertical fields, form effective solutions, and allow technological innovations to be applied.
The plane of ecology: support developers and partners, connect multiple parties into an alliance chain ecosystem through various methods such as technology open source, community activities, resource support, training and education, and expand the application of the underlying technology of the blockchain scale.
As Zhou Yu, the person in charge of China UnionPay blockchain, said, the open source of Weizhong blockchain after successful exploration can effectively promote the promotion of technology.
At present, the open source alliance chain ecosystem led by Weizhong blockchain has brought together more than 3,000 enterprises and institutions, and more than 70,000 individual members, and has gathered more partners to promote ESG development.
The advanced road of Weizhong blockchain is to follow this point-line-surface logical development, and constantly promote technology to truly integrate into the social fabric.
After nearly seven years of rapid development, WeZong blockchain has completed the accumulation of technology, scenarios, and ecology. Under the background of the new era, it can give full play to its existing advantages, accelerate the practice of ESG concepts, and build ESG credibility. Infrastructure, supporting a series of national strategies such as digital economy, double carbon, rural revitalization, and self-reliance in science and technology. This new mission will also push ESG practice to the eve of fusion.
future:
Technology butterflies set off an ESG fusion storm
Looking into the future, the exploration of Weizhong blockchain is like a technological butterfly, gently flapping its wings, brewing a future hurricane that will sweep you and me.
In this press conference, Weizhong Blockchain also set up a corresponding plan for the new mission: "two foundations + two promotions", to promote ESG application and talent cultivation based on the solid foundation of open source technology and open source ecology.
According to logical deduction, this plan will sweep several key words that are crucial to the future in turn.
1. Talent. Undoubtedly, the future of the country and mankind is in the hands of talents, especially the high-tech and comprehensive talents in the field of cutting-edge technology, which need long-term and high-quality resource cultivation. The ESG application of blockchain is a very novel field. The exercise of human ability and social responsibility is very beneficial. The talent cultivation system established by Weizhong blockchain in conjunction with the Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, training institutions, and enterprises will provide a steady stream of talent momentum for future blockchain development.
2. Standard. In the uncertainty of the global situation, mastering the technical standards at the infrastructure level means holding the direction of technological development and the right to speak in your own hands. Especially in the development of ESG, which involves the interests of multiple parties, China must tell its own story within its own theoretical system and technical framework. The establishment of standards relies on solid technological breakthroughs and industrial advantages. From this point of view, Weizhong Blockchain looks forward to strengthening cooperation with more ecological partners, transforming existing fintech practices and de facto standards into industry standards, and enhancing the international competitiveness of the entire industry.
3. Society. If technology is not widely used, it will lose its source of life. Once upon a time, the Wintel Wen Tailai Alliance swept the global PC market and directly established the dominance of the x86 computing architecture. In the same way, various domestic self-developed technologies cannot only exist in the laboratory. Only when they are widely used in various fields of the digital economy can they truly establish core advantages. Therefore, Weizhong blockchain will open source the full-stack technology system, accelerate the marketization and large-scale application of blockchain technology, and form social influence while also consolidating the vitality of technology on the social soil.
With the talent base, industry voice, and social participation, the ESG application of blockchain technology will have a steady stream of vitality and vitality.
There is a saying in the field of technology that people always overestimate what can be done in one or two years, and underestimate what can be done in five or ten years. It has been nearly seven years since WeBank invested in the blockchain, and financial technology centered on blockchain technology is on the fulcrum of ESG, profoundly affecting society, industry and life.
Philosopher Andrew Feinberg pointed out in the book "Technology System" that society and technology co-produce one another, and the inherent trend of technological development will be the coordinated action of nature, human beings, and technological elements. WeZong blockchain is committed to building ESG credible infrastructure, pointing to a similar technological development path: to create a hurricane with small wings, and set off a butterfly effect of fair and sustainable development in the whole society.
