Brazilian Development Bank has officially launched Brazilian Blockchain Network (RBB) which is a public and distributed blockchain. It went live on May 30th this year.

With the cooperation agreement between the Court of Accounts of Union (TCU) and the Brazilian Development Bank (BNDES) this Blockchain Network has been launched. It is a structure designed to support other institutions in increasing public transparency in the country. Court of Accounts of the Union has assisted the launching event. It was live streamed on the official YouTube channel. The aims to have its first working applications ready by 2023. The focus of the event was to discuss the technical aspects of the project based on the experiences of several guests that includes public officials, company executives, and representatives of university institutions. It serves as a starting point to call for more institutions to collaborate with the development to this project.

RBB is still in its experimental stages in the laboratories of the institutions. Initially it will be used in several public institutions. The intention is to improve the services offered to citizens and provide greater traceability on public expenditures. New government is taking this effort to integrate blockchain technology into the public administration for a more efficient and transparent workflow.

Since 2018 the network has been in development. The Brazilian Development Bank has recently started releasing details about its technical operation. Gladstone Arantes revealed in March that the design of the network would be based on a proof-of-authority consensus mechanism, with no mining on top of the chain. He also disclosed that the project would use Hyperledger Besu 2.0 as its base.

This network seeks to solve the distrust issue that Brazilians have of state institutions which is the biggest problem. As per the director of the Information Technology Inspection Department of the Court of Accounts of the Union, Wesley Vaz, moving public processes to a blockchain, and making them follow established constraints can help with this issue.

The president of the Brazilian Development Bank who is in charge of the development of the network, Gustavo Montezano announced that the organization will sign agreements with other government institutions to collaborate on this task. He further added that the next step for the Brazilian Blockchain Network would be to establish a working production prototype, so other third parties can focus on building apps on the network.

According to president of Uniam TCU, Ana Arraes, during the second half of 2019 the idea of using blockchain technology came up. She further added, use of Blockchain technology offers advantages like greater protection, transparency and integrity in storage of information in public databases which allow auditing the data provided for public spending hence this topic had been very relevant within the Government discussions.” João Alexandre Lopes, manager of the Information Technology Area of BNDES, said they will open their doors for partners to enjoy mutually the benefit from blockchain technology using this common infrastructure once the project gets formalized. 

Indrani bose

CBW - External Analyst

INDIA