Enjin plans to use NFTs to promote sustainability and equality as member of UN pact

The United Nations Global Compact, a nonbinding pact aimed at encouraging businesses to adopt sustainable, socially responsible policies, has accepted nonfungible token (NFT) and blockchain gaming platform Enjin as a participant.

Enjin announced on Tuesday that it would be exploring ways to use NFTs to promote sustainability and equality as part of the UN pact. The company suggested using the technology to fight climate change by employing it in carbon-capture companies and reducing the global wealth gap by allowing creators around the world permissionless access to NFT markets.

"While we are struggling to recover from the global pandemic and its impacts, we are experiencing exponential growth of technologies like AI and blockchain,” said the head of the Centre for AI and Robotics at the United Nations Interregional Crime and Justice Research Institute, Irakli Beridze. “More than ever, we need to take advantage and harness the potential of these new technologies to ensure that we are better equipped and more united in the future, in order to make our planet a more livable, equitable place for all."

The United Nations has listed 17 goals on sustainable development it hopes to achieve by 2030, including reducing inequality, providing quality education, and encouraging responsible consumption and production. Esther Chang, executive director of the Global Compact Network Singapore, said Enjin’s involvement with the UN pact could help meet these goals, as “technology plays an important role.”

The company has already joined initiatives aiming toward greener, more sustainable practices, including the Crypto Climate Accord, in which participants commit to achieving net-zero emissions from electricity consumption. Enjin said it planned to enable carbon-neutral NFTs by 2030 and claimed its JumpNet blockchain is already carbon-negative

Related: Enjin takes an interest in project that delivers physically backed NFTs

Environmental concerns have taken the spotlight in global industries, including crypto and blockchain, as the effects of climate change seem to be escalating. The UN has said that blockchain has the potential to address the climate crisis and help reach a more sustainable global economy.