RESTORING ROHINGYA IDENTITY

For decades, Rohingya have endured genocide, forced displacement from their ancestral lands, and made stateless, living largely undocumented in various countries, denied basic rights. They seek sustainable solutions to rebuild their identity and community.

The Rohingya Project is a grassroots initiative dedicated to preserving and promoting Rohingya identity through decentralized ID, utilizing blockchain to enable access to learning, skill-building, and empowerment opportunities, ultimately leading to a dignified future.

MISSION

The mission of the Rohingya Project is to create a digital interactive ecosystem that addresses two dimensions of the Rohingya crisis: Identity and inclusion.

Firstly, there are two aspects of identity: individual and collective. Individual identity pertains to the basic proof of Rohingya membership. Collective identity involves awareness of Rohingya heritage, customs, and historical ties to their ancestral land of Arakan.

Secondly, we aim to enable access to learning, skill-building, collaboration, and the self-development needed to become active and responsible members of the wider community.

ISSUE

For over 30 years Rohingya have lived in a limbo of statelessness. They have been driven out of their ancestral land and live largely undocumented in different countries across the world and denied even basic rights that people take for granted. As a result of their stateless condition, the 3.5 million Rohingya live as an invisible people on the margins, and are vulnerable to destitution, human trafficking, and other maladies. Many second and third generation stateless Rohingya live a shadow existence in their host societies and encounter significant obstacles in generating a livelihood and keeping themselves out of poverty.

SOLUTION

The mission of the Project is to create the foundation for a viable future for the stateless Rohingya by connecting them digitally to opportunities to learn, equip and empower themselves. Through the creation of a Digital Interactive Ecosystem, those Rohingya who for years have been sidelined can be given access to a range of virtual services including online education, digital identity and reward tokens. The platform will tap into potential of the Rohingya community and other marginalized people and offer options to counter their exclusion from the mainstream.

UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

By 2030, ensure that all men and women, in particular the poor and the vulnerable, have equal rights to economic resources, as well as access to basic services, ownership and control over land and other forms of property, inheritance, natural resources, appropriate new technology and financial services, including microfinance

4.4 – By 2030, substantially increase the number of youth and adults who have relevant skills, including technical and vocational skills, for employment, decent jobs and entrepreneurship

By 2030, achieve full and productive employment and decent work for all women and men, including for young people and persons with disabilities, and equal pay for work of equal value

16.9 – By 2030, provide legal identity for all, including birth registration

By 2030, reduce to less than 3 per cent the transaction costs of migrant remittances and eliminate remittance corridors with costs higher than 5 per cent

DISPLACED ROHINGYA WORLWIDE

OUR JOURNEY

2017

Project Launched

Project Launched in Kuala Lumpur

2018

Research Collaboration

A feasibility by University of Washington: Report

2020

R-Coin Pilot

Incentivizing Community services: Report

2021

R-Academy Pilot

Providing Education & Skills: Report

2022

Historical Library Pilot

A digital repository of historical and cultural memory: Report

2024

Launch of R-Academy

Skill building and educational platform: Visit

PARTNERS

As the Rohingya Project intersects with different key areas, including migration, financial technology, healthcare, etc., we look forward to working together with other stakeholders. Learn more about our Partners

FEATURED

OUR STORY

Life as a Rohingya - Message from Co-founder

As one of the Rohingya, I can say that each passing year seems to be a step back in time for us. In the course of the past 35 years, we have gone from a people with a sense of belonging and security in our homeland, to a people who are now called ‘the world’s most persecuted minority’. Whereas once we were a thriving culture, now we have been effectively disowned by our own state and scattered to the four corners of the Earth. The passage of each year is now a reminder of how our collective dignity is becoming a distant memory.

This has been much international uproar over the recent round of persecution in Rakhine since the middle of 2017. Yet this is nothing new for the Rohingya. Over the past several decades, and in particular over the past five years, such violence has become almost a routine spectacle for our people. What has received significantly less attention over this time, though, is the condition our people face in between these outbreaks of repression. The world knows well the Rohingya as victims of conflict, but they know far less of what hardships the Rohingya experience as a stateless people.

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