The Chinese government is launching a “very large blockchain infrastructure platform for the Belt and Road Initiative.” It is intended to support the implementation of cross-border cooperation projects.
Blockchain, Belt and Road
Let's start with what the Belt and Road is. This is China's key geopolitical initiative today. The Beijing authorities want to somehow recreate the famous, historical Silk Road. In practice, this will involve the expansion of the infrastructure network connecting China, the countries of Central Asia, the Middle East, Africa and Europe. One of the main corridors is to run through Russia, Belarus and Poland.
The idea could revolutionize the world economy and undermine the power of the United States. The point is that since the time of geographical discoveries, the foundation of the power of maritime powers (Spain, Great Britain and now the USA) has been control over water routes. The construction of China's Belt and Road will be a game changer. This will allow the “earth” countries to take over the baton from the USA again in history.
Now blockchain comes into play in all this. This is the project “Very Large-Scale Blockchain Infrastructure Platform for the Belt and Road Initiative”.
Leaders meeting
The project is led by Conflux Network, which organized a meeting with project leaders and participants on March 30 to share its implementation plan. Experts from the Industrial Development Promotion Center of the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and the Science and Technology Commission of the city of Shanghai appeared on site.
Conflux said the main goal of the project is to “create a public blockchain infrastructure platform” to “support the implementation of cross-border cooperation projects under the Belt and Road Initiative.” Moreover, the platform will provide the foundation for applications that promote seamless cross-border collaboration.
The project is also led by the Shanghai Shutu Blockchain Research Institute, the China Academy of Information and Communication Technology, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Fudan University and Shanghai Maritime University.
Chinese journalist Clin Wu, who researches the project, pointed to the strange policy of China, whose government “forbids any institution to engage in cryptocurrency-related activities” and at the same time develops the mentioned initiative. This means that the Chinese blockchain “in this case should not include cryptocurrency or any tokens.”
