Ghana Releases Design Paper of Its Central Bank Digital Currency
Financial Inclusion through eCedi
In its design paper, the central bank highlighted that the digital currency would function widely on a popular payment platform run by mobile-phone service providers. As mobile and card-based payments are already popular in the West African nation, therefore, the eCedi will complement existing digital payment networks, according to the central bank.
“It is important that the eCedi is implemented to complement and enhance the existing payment systems. The various existing electronic and mobile payment solutions will therefore have to be interoperable with the eCedi to enable their utilization of the eCedi.”
The central bank also wants to ensure that through the use of the eCedi, there is an improvement in financial inclusion, however, it didn’t specify how this would be accomplished.
The plans for an offline wallet were also included in the eCedi’s offline functionality to bring unbanked individuals under the CBDC system in addition to developing smart cards, and smart wristbands to facilitate offline peer-to-peer transactions.
Ghana unveiled plans for the eCedi last year and is currently being developed with German payments firm Giesecke+Devrient.