In Northwest Syria, a critical network of hospitals faces a unique challenge: how do you pay medical staff and fund healthcare when your country is completely cut off from the global financial system?

Due to economic sanctions and a fractured banking infrastructure following over a decade of civil war, humanitarian organizations like the Union of Medical Care and Relief Organizations (UOSSM) have struggled to safely distribute funds.

Previously, hospital employees had to embark on grueling, risky journeys to the Turkish border, waiting in long lines for hours just to collect their salaries in physical cash.

In this episode, we take a firsthand look at how the evolution of cross-border payments is impacting real lives on the ground.

UOSSM is sending bulk payments to its employees on the blockchain, who receive their salaries in their digital wallets, and then use informal Hawala networks to off-ramp the digital dollars into cash.

In this episode of Money Trails, presented by‪ Stellar Development Foundation‬ we're joined by Ibrahim Abdulhuseyin, CEO & Co-founder & CEO of DigiBank, Tori Samples, the Director of Product, Stellar, and Younes Al-Haj Saleh, from UOSSM's Financial Operations.

Watch the full episode on YouTube.

00:00 - Intro
01:27 - How employees used to get paid
02:38 - Civil war and sanctions
03:47 - UOSSM's payment struggles
05:58 - Stablecoin payments
06:49 - How Digibank built Syria's cash-out network
08:38 - Bulk payments with SDP
10:30 - Aid orgs are crypto adopters

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💻 Website - https://theflip.africa

Drive through cities in Africa and you’re likely to see a waste problem. In the streets, the sewage, in the waterways…540 million tons of waste goes uncollected every year across sub-Saharan Africa.

It's a $16 billion opportunity. But much of the infrastructure is still missing. What would it actually take to build it at scale?

In Nigeria, a company called Scrapays is paying people to collect it. In Kenya, Plas-tech is turning the same plastic into cooking gas.

00:00 - Where does your waste go?
01:25 - In Lagos, Scrapay’s Boluwatife Arewa is empowering informal waste pickers
05:44 - In Mombosa, Plas-tech’s Robin Kariuki is turning waste into cooking gas
09:13 - The multi-billion dollar opportunity in waste

This episode was produced as part of our series on climate action in Africa, The Greenprint, in partnership with Catalyst Fund and FSD Africa, with the help of UK aid.

Watch more episodes of The Greenprint here.

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💻 Website - https://theflip.africa

In Lagos' Computer Village, Nigeria's largest electronics market, everything is imported from China. But how merchants access dollars and pay their suppliers is a challenge.

Nigeria imports $20 billion from China every year, yet dollar access problems and legacy banking systems create friction for those doing global trade.

So how do countries like Nigeria and China trade with each other?

In this episode, we head to Lagos, Nigeria, to see it firsthand - how money moves, and how new technologies like stablecoins are facilitating global trade.

In this episode of Money Trails, presented by Stellar Development Foundation.

Watch the full episode on YouTube.

00:00 - Inside Computer Village
01:22 - Everything is imported from China
02:32 - The Nigerian Economy
03:56 - Importing phones with WeChat and Alipay
05:18 - No one uses the banks for FX
06:17 - Naira volatility, explained
09:10 - Informal and parallel economies
09:38 OTC Traders Fill the Gap
11:21 - Are stablecoins the future of global trade?
14:43 - Next stop: Syria

Our Links -
🎥 YouTube - https://youtube.com/@thefliphq
🐦 Twitter - https://twitter.com/thefliphq
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💻 Website - https://theflip.africa