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Blockchain has been recognized for its potential to transform finance and other industries that rely on data, but what happens when innovation meets the worlds oldest industry agriculture? It turns out that blockchain has a lot to offer to the food and agriculture sectors, especially when merged with other innovative technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI), satellites and the Internet of Things (IoT).

The agricultural sector can join the tech revolution to upgrade every aspect that has to do with transactions and data. For example, blockchain could streamline processes related to the supply chain by increasing traceability and bringing automation to the table.

A report from InsightAce Analyticsfound that blockchain in the agriculture and food supply chain is a market valued at over $280 million as of 2022, and is expected to grow to over $7billion by 2031, demonstrating a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 43.76% during that period.

Thanks to its unique architecture that involves decentralization, blockchain ensures the highest possible degree of transparency and traceability, which are key elements in the agricultural sector. Decentralized networks enable participants, including farmers, producers, retailers and exporters, to monitor and address major challenges showing up in the supply chain. Eventually, blockchain records can be used for analysis purposes to improve various aspects of the supply chain.

The adoption of blockchain in agriculture can also help regulatory compliance and reporting. By ensuring the provision of accurate, up-to-date, tamper-proof data, stakeholders can make better-informed decisions and implement proper corporate governance. Decentralized networks also simplify the distribution of certification data among relevant parties.

Besides transparency, blockchain can facilitate other advancements in the agricultural sector. For instance, it can enable better management of land rights, more efficient food safety tracking, and enhanced traceability of inputs like seeds and fertilizers.

Tech giants have realized the potential of decentralized ledger technology for agriculture. For example, IBM provides businesses with a permissioned blockchain platform called IBM Food Trust, which offers multiple features, including proof of origin, traceability, fraud monitoring and documentation, among others.

Agricultural companies can also leverage blockchain solutions that rely on public networks, which ensure a higher degree of decentralization and security. One example is Dimitra, an AgTech company that aims to help farmers reduce the amount of labor required to complete manual tasks by integrating its technology stack, which combines blockchain, AI, IoT, drones and satellites.

Source: Dimitra

Dimitra offers digital solutions to help farmers gather data to make smarter and faster decisions to improve their crop yields and increase sustainability.

For Dimitra CEO Jon Trask, the integration of blockchain and other innovative technologies into agricultural processes is natural and imperative. He said: Every smallholder farmer, regardless of economic status, should be able to benefit from simple, beautiful and useful technology, because when farmers thrive, economies thrive.

Dimitra offers four main AgTech applications:

Source: Dimitra

The Dimitra ecosystem is fueled by its proprietary Ethereum-based token, DMTR. It acts as a utility token for the Connected Farmer app that helps farmers worldwide increase sustainability and make informed decisions.

To spread its mission and technology, Dimitra is also working with governments, agencies, NGOs and for-profit organizations. The company was awarded a contract from the OBC Indian Chamber of Commerce, Industries and Agriculture for deploying its Connected Farmer app to 1.3 million farms for soil assessment and remediation. Elsewhere, Dimitra partnered with an organization in the worlds third-largest fruit producing country, the Brazilian Association of Fruit Producers and Exporters. Its members represent more than 85% of the total fruit exported by Brazil.

Dimitra has demonstrated that integrating blockchain with other innovations like AI, satellites and IoT can revolutionize the agricultural sector. By increasing transparency, traceability and efficiency, these advancements offer major opportunities for improving supply chain management, regulatory compliance and land rights management.

Disclaimer. Cointelegraph does not endorse any content or product on this page. While we aim at providing you with all important information that we could obtain in this sponsored article, readers should do their own research before taking any actions related to the company and carry full responsibility for their decisions, nor can this article be considered as investment advice.

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Unlocking agricultures full potential with blockchain and innovative tech - Cointelegraph

When building Bitcoin, Satoshi Nakamoto envisioned a decentralized digital currency that could operate without the need for centralized institutions such as banks and governments.

Satoshi did not picture a situation where a few entities controlled a significant portion of the entire network, essentially centralizing power and influence.

Bitcoin mining centralization, a result of market competition over the years, goes against the fundamental principle of cryptocurrency.

Bitcoin mining centralization is the concentration of mining power among a few dominant players. Originally, anyone with a computer and internet connection could mine Bitcoin. However, the network grew with time, and as a result, mining became more competitive.

This led to the development of specialized chips known as ASICs (Application Specific Integrated Circuits), which outperformed GPUs and CPUs by being more efficient. Unfortunately, ASICs are expensive and out of reach for most people, and the fact that newer, better, but more costly versions are released exacerbates the situation.

Miners began to form pools to combine their computing power and share the rewards earned. The largest pools also acquire the latest technologies to stay ahead of the competition, which caused others who couldn't keep up to drop off.

Over time, a few large mining pools, including Foundry USA, Antpool, and F2Pool, have come to dominate the Bitcoin mining industry, controlling a significant percentage of the total hash rate at any given time. This beats the logic of cryptocurrency, which is supposed to distribute power among many players.

Several factors contribute to the centralization of Bitcoin mining. Most of these factors also apply in a typical competitive market. They include

While Bitcoin mining centralization is a natural process inspired by competition, it presents a few challenges to the network and ecosystem.

All these challenges require careful consideration and action if the integrity and security of the Bitcoin ecosystem are to be preserved. But how?

Over time, various parties have suggested ways to solve the centralization issue.

Bitcoin Core developer Matt Corrallo proposed the BetterHash Protocol, which involves decentralizing the selection of transactions going into a block to individual hardware operators. However, it didn't provide a mechanism that would ensure miners will choose transactions that create a balanced difficulty for the Bitcoin network hence opening another loophole for centralization. It also introduced inefficiencies due to the need to constantly monitor the network, which was hard to adopt.

Meanwhile, the crypto mining pool P2Pool suggested decentralizing payouts to address the issue. However, by decentralizing payouts, small miners who rely on consistent payouts to cover costs would be disadvantaged. Also, it required low-latency connections between miners and the P2Pool server, which meant whenever a miner experienced high latency, their mining performance would be negatively impacted. For these reasons, it didn't incentivize its adoption.

The most direct way to solve Bitcoin mining centralization is to decentralize the mining pools. This can be achieved through incentives that encourage the use of smaller and more decentralized mining pools. A practical incentive would be to fund innovation and experimentation by small miners, leading to better and more competitive mining strategies.

Notably, former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey's payment company, Block, started working on an open Bitcoin mining system to make the network more decentralized and permissionless. Block aimed to build its own high-performance open-source ASIC and a Bitcoin wallet to make Bitcoin custody more mainstream.

Nevertheless, incentives alone may not be enough to encourage decentralization. Regulatory policies, network upgrades, and community initiatives may also be necessary to encourage the growth of smaller and more decentralized mining pools.

It's difficult to predict that Bitcoin mining will become more decentralized. Mining power will remain centralized among dominant players as mining becomes more expensive.

Due to economies of scale and other bottlenecks, smaller miners continue to struggle against the big dogs. As a result, it would take tremendous efforts by the rest of the Bitcoin network to implement strategies and solutions to solve Bitcoin mining centralization.

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What Is Bitcoin Mining Centralization and Why Is It a Concern? - MUO - MakeUseOf

NEAR Protocol, the open-source and climate-neutral blockchain, has officially gone live as a Blockchain Operating System (BOS), which makes Web3 usable for all.

With the launch of BOS, anyone can create their own frontends and customise them to work with the blockchain of their choice. This groundbreaking development means that builders from any ecosystem can easily create components with just a few lines of code and take advantage of fast onboarding to create new and custom Web3 experiences.

Illia Polosukhin, Co-founder of NEAR Protocol and CEO of Pagoda, stated that With the Blockchain Operating System, were empowering builders to create custom Web3 experiences with ease.

This innovative technology opens up new avenues for collaboration as it is multichain and democratises access to all blockchains, making it more accessible than ever before. We look forward to the endless possibilities this technology will unlock and the transformative impact it will have on industries across the globe. Polosukhin said.

BOS is a revolutionary industry-first category that establishes the NEAR Protocol as the entry point for browsing and discovering apps and experiences that are compatible with any blockchain.

The BOS removes one of the main challenges of decentralization by allowing developers to deploy apps once and make them available everywhere while giving users an easy way to discover them. The BOS is accessible to everyone, regardless of their familiarity with Web3 technology.

Read also:Former Twitter CEO launches alternative platform, Bluesky

Developers can quickly create apps on a decentralized front end using pre-existing components and a familiar coding experience. With just a few lines of JavaScript, developers can build on any chain, and because BOS is built for multi-chain compatibility developers will be able to deploy their apps anywhere, and have them discovered everywhere.

Also, BOS creates a way for enterprises to quickly onboard Web3. Because BOS is built on JavaScript, one of the most used coding languages, enterprises can build new technological capabilities, roll out new products and experiences, and create opportunities for new revenue without the need for a specific Web3 development team, or complex system integrations.

The company stated that since its inception has been to onboard 1 billion users to a more free, fair, and open web. The first step in the journey was to focus on building a best-in-class L1 blockchain that was easy to build on and use.

The addition of composable frontends to the tech stack enables the NEAR Protocol to function as the Blockchain Operating System, allowing seamless, one-time onboarding for users and eliminating friction points such as the need to create new accounts for each experience. With over 1,800 components available, this technology will supercharge development, making it faster and more efficient than ever before.

Furthermore, the launch of the BOS marks a new era in the evolution of Web3 and the creation of a more open web, and the NEAR Foundation is proud to lead the way.

NEAR Protocol, the open-source and climate-neutral blockchain, has officially gone live as a Blockchain Operating System (BOS), which makes Web3 usable for all.With the launch of BOS, anyone can create their own frontends and customise them to work with the blockchain of their choice. This groundbreaking development means that builders from any ecosystem can easily create components with just a few lines of code and take advantage of fast onboarding to create new and custom Web3 experiences.Illia Polosukhin, Co-founder of NEAR Protocol and CEO of Pagoda, stated that With the Blockchain Operating System, were empowering builders to create custom Web3 experiences with ease.This innovative technology opens up new avenues for collaboration as it is multichain and democratises access to all blockchains, making it more accessible than ever before. We look forward to the endless possibilities this technology will unlock and the transformative impact it will have on industries across the globe. Polosukhin said.BOS is a revolutionary industry-first category that establishes the NEAR Protocol as the entry point for browsing and discovering apps and experiences that are compatible with any blockchain.The BOS removes one of the main challenges of decentralization by allowing developers to deploy apps once and make them available everywhere while giving users an easy way to discover them. The BOS is accessible to everyone, regardless of their familiarity with Web3 technology.Read also:Former Twitter CEO launches alternative platform, BlueskyDevelopers can quickly create apps on a decentralized front end using pre-existing components and a familiar coding experience. With just a few lines of JavaScript, developers can build on any chain, and because BOS is built for multi-chain compatibility developers will be able to deploy their apps anywhere, and have them discovered everywhere.Also, BOS creates a way for enterprises to quickly onboard Web3. Because BOS is built on JavaScript, one of the most used coding languages, enterprises can build new technological capabilities, roll out new products and experiences, and create opportunities for new revenue without the need for a specific Web3 development team, or complex system integrations.The company stated that since its inception has been to onboard 1 billion users to a more free, fair, and open web. The first step in the journey was to focus on building a best-in-class L1 blockchain that was easy to build on and use.The addition of composable frontends to the tech stack enables the NEAR Protocol to function as the Blockchain Operating System, allowing seamless, one-time onboarding for users and eliminating friction points such as the need to create new accounts for each experience. With over 1,800 components available, t...

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Near Blockchain Operating System goes live, onboard Web3 - Businessday

dYdX, one of the most popular decentralized crypto trading platforms, announced the launch of its private testnet on the Cosmos blockchain. The testnet brings the DeFi crypto exchange one step closer to transitioning to a completely decentralized model from its current hybrid decentralized model.

According to a blog post by dYdX, the DeFi exchange recently achieved the third out of five milestones with the finalization of the private testnets launch. The launch is slated for 28 March 2023 and is expected to last between 2-3 weeks. The third milestone covers several objectives including Advanced order types, Dynamic funding rates, and documentation for Validators, among other things.

The decentralized trading platform plans to launch a fully public testnet by the end of July this year, thereby expanding the number of validators testing the changes. The DeFi exchange is anticipating the complete transition to Cosmos from Ethereum by September 2023, which is when its mainnet will go live.

Antonio Juliano, founder, and CEO of dYdX told Bloomberg that the end game is full decentralization for his crypto exchange. The Cosmos mainnet will help eliminate centralized entities that are currently involved with the exchanges operations. The move towards decentralization is also expected to help with the current regulatory landscape in the United States as authorities step up the crackdown on crypto.

I think the end state for everything in DeFi has to be full decentralization. The middle ground doesnt really work indefinitely.

News of the testnets imminent launch has sent native token DYDX soaring. The token has gained more than 12% since the announcement earlier, going from $2.1 all the way up to $2.4 at the time of writing.

Originally posted here:

dYdX Up 12% Following The Announcement Of Cosmos Testnet - Ethereum World News

(Kitco News)-MakerDAO, the decentralized finance (DeFi) lending protocol responsible for issuing the DAI decentralized stablecoin, continues to be one of the best examples of how a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) is supposed to function after the successful approval of the Maker Constitution.

According to a press release shared with Kitcoin Crypto, the MakerDAO community has voted in favor of a governance poll on the MakerDAO forum intended to ratify the Maker Constitution, which will gradually change the operations of MakerDAO and enable the implementation of its Endgame Era roadmap.

The Maker Constitution is a set of 11 constitutional articles and 12 scope frameworks that lay down the fundamental conditions for MakerDAO to move into Endgame Era, which charts a restructuring proposal for the DAO and outlines a path for MakerDAO and DAI to achieve maximum levels of simplicity, decentralization, and resilience.

Endgame is designed to allow MakerDAO to expand its money market investments in the short term and increase protocol revenue, which will be used to buy decentralized collateral such as ETH and staked ETH to reinforce the DAI backing, ensure its stability and maximize its level of decentralization in the long term.

In the months ahead, the implementation of the Maker Constitution will enable public good and charitable purpose for MakerDAO; achieve a maximum decentralized-state for the DAI stablecoin; incentivize voters towards transparency through regulated governance; elect members of MakerDAO with defined responsibilities surrounding MakerDAOs governance operations; and introduce SubDAOs as self-governing and self-sustaining entities within the MakerDAO ecosystem, the press release said.

Once Endgame Era has been fully implemented, MakerDAO will enter the Endgame State, the ultimate vision for DAI and the Maker ecosystem. In Endgame State, SubDAOs will be able to operate as independent entities using their own tokens, helping to increase MakerDAOs level of accessibility and decentralization.

There will be three categories of SubDAOs: FacilitatorDAOs, CreatorDAOs and ProtectorDAOS.

FacilitatorDAOs will be responsible for organizing the Decentralized Workforce of Maker, CreatorDAOs will focus on growth and innovation in the Maker ecosystem and ProtectorDAOs have been tasked with allocating collateral to real-world assets and protecting MakerDAO against physical and legal threats to its real-world asset collateral.

Endgame Era is also designed to increase the resiliency of the DAI stablecoin.

As part of the rollout of the Constitution, Maker plans on improving accessibility by providing easy-to-use software tools, such as data dashboards and AI chatbots, to make the rules, processes and governance results auditable for all DAO participants.

The Constitution also installs the Constitutional Voter Committees (CVCs), Constitutional Delegates (CDs) and Constitutional Conservers (CCs), which fundamentally restructure how the DAO is organized and help to increase its level of decentralization.

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and may not reflect those of Kitco Metals Inc. The author has made every effort to ensure accuracy of information provided; however, neither Kitco Metals Inc. nor the author can guarantee such accuracy. This article is strictly for informational purposes only. It is not a solicitation to make any exchange in commodities, securities or other financial instruments. Kitco Metals Inc. and the author of this article do not accept culpability for losses and/ or damages arising from the use of this publication.

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MakerDAO's 'Endgame Era' begins with the ratification of 'Constitution' - Kitco NEWS