We were introduced to BCH by coming across @SofiaCBCH's twitter feed which lead us to her read.cash articles. We knew about bitcoin, but crypto adoption here in Mexico is at almost 0%. After diving down the rabbit hole we came to understand the reasoning behind the split in 2017, and the need for big blocks. We came across this article by @georgedonnelly which further explained the current affairs in which BCH is in. After spending some time sifting through conversations in different telegram groups we feel confident come November 15th there will be a split and the problems ABC are bringing to the table will no longer be relevant. Provided this information we feel confident BCH would be a great alternative to the Peso, for the people.
A large percentage of people in Mexico are under-banked and BCH could help solve that. Cryptovato1 reached out to us with interest in helping us. We would like to start the process in creating adoption for BCH in Mexico. We could definitely use advice from the prominent members in the community on how we can achieve this goal.
Helping those nobody else will
We came across an all male rehabilitation center in Centro Guadalajara. After talking to the primary caregiver of the facility we learned a lot of unsettling things about shelters here in Mexico. Most shelter facilities that house people in Mexico are underfunded or are funded out of pocket. The Mexican government, being secular, does not grant financing to facilities that have religious backgrounds. This is difficult as Mexico is claimed to be 85% Catholic. This cuts government funding almost completely out of a large majority of shelters.
In Mexico we have a fiscal document known as "factura". This is an official document that is received when making a transaction for taxing purposes, wether is a business purchase or a donation. It is tax deduction receipt. In order for a shelter to give you a factura receipt, they must be a registered Asociación Civil. The process of becoming registered is expensive, tedious, and the rejection rate is very high. Therefore, there are no monetary incentives to donate to these shelters. This leaves a large percentage of shelters in Mexico severely underfunded. We felt like this was a good place to start. We didn't know what else to do so we came out of pocket and made our first donation.
We ended up getting a bit more than anticipated
80 KG all purpose detergent
40 liters of bleach
60 liters of Pinol
200 shaving razors
200 toothbrushes
200 tubes of toothpaste
220 packs of cookies
184 rolls of TP
550 bars of soap
We put together 23k Pesos out of our pocket and hit our local market to pick up some of the basic stuff we were instructed the shelter needed. We were asked what church we were from and why would donate without incentive. We explained that we are not from the church and we are interested in helping out.
Bridging the gap
We think using these donations is a great way to reach the under-banked and use this opportunity to onboard the people here in Mexico that need BCH as a banking solution the most. We obviously have a long way to go to start onboarding merchants, but we think this is the best way to start. We will be coming up with a roadmap on how we plan on doing that through donations and BCH conferences. This will be outlined in our upcoming flipstarter campaign. We have 10 more facilities we are going to reach out to and make donations to. Feel free to reach out to us if you would like to help or have any advice. Comments are much appreciated!