South Africa-Swiss Bilateral Research Chair in Blockchain Technology

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South Africa-Swiss Bilateral Research Chair in Blockchain Technology

Research Chair focused on integrating Blockchain Technology into supply chain management.

14/09/2026

Weekend Training: Tokenization in Blockchain

Last Saturday (12 September 2026), the weekend training programme of the South Africa-Switzerland Bilateral Research Chair in Blockchain Technology ( ) was on , giving participants hands-on exposure to working with tokens on the .

Participants built and deployed their own token, then worked through real-world use cases of tokens across the blockchain domain. Going from concept to a live, deployed token in one session gave the group a genuine feel for how the technology actually works.

More sessions lie ahead as the programme continues to build progressively, each one adding another practical skill to what participants have picked up so far.

24/08/2026

DAOs, Governance & Tokenomics

Last Saturday (22 August 2026), the weekend training programme of the South Africa-Swiss Bilateral Research Chair in Blockchain Technology ( ) brought in an industry guest facilitator, Ms Kendall Viljoen, Blockchain Analytics Manager at Provenance, for a session on , & .

Students explored how authority, resources and accountability are structured within , along with the design choices behind token-based economies. Teams were then given a practical challenge: pick a real-world problem and design a DAO-based solution for it. What they came up with showed how well they understood these concepts.

Thank you, Ms Viljoen, for giving your time and expertise to our students. Bringing in guest facilitators like this is how we keep the programme practical, ensuring that we bridge what the industry actually needs with hands-on, real-world training.

24/08/2026

Weekend Training: Fundamentals of Blockchain Technology Development & Web 3.0 Technology

On 8 August 2026, the South Africa-Swiss Bilateral Research Chair in Blockchain Technology ( ) kicked off the second-semester edition of its weekend training programme, structured to build progressively over the coming weekends.

Participants chose one of two tracks to follow throughout the programme:
- Fundamentals of Technology Development, or
- Fundamentals of Technology.

Each track opened with an introductory session taught in a practical, hands-on way, giving students a feel for the real work behind the concepts rather than theory alone.

Letting students choose their own path meant everyone started from what interests them most, whether that is how blockchain systems are built or how the wider Web3 ecosystem works.

More sessions to follow in the coming weekends, each building on what students have learned in previous sessions.

04/08/2026

🎓 New PhD: building human capacity for the 4IR water-energy-food nexus

Prof Nnamdi Nwulu, Chairholder of the South Africa-Swiss Bilateral Research Chair in Blockchain Technology and Director of the Centre for Cyber-Physical Food, Energy &Water Systems (CCP-FEWS), and the entire research team congratulate Dr. Oluwadamilola Esan, who graduated with her PhD on 29 July 2026.

Dr Esan's thesis, "Building human capacity for the fourth industrial revolution in South Africa's water, energy and food nexus," developed a multi-level framework connecting policy direction, organisational strategy and individual competencies to practical deployment within the water-energy-food nexus, offering practical guidelines for policymakers, industry practitioners and researchers. She was supervised by Prof Nwulu and co-supervised by Prof Omoseni Adepoju (PhD).

To mark the milestone, the team gathered for a celebration lunch, where Dr Esan reflected on her journey, and colleagues shared their own experiences working with her. We were glad to be joined by Prof Omowunmi Mary Longe, Electrical Engineering; Dr. Patrick Ehi Imoisili., Mechanical Engineering; Ms Lebogang M. Ayobiojo, University of Johannesburg (UJ) Community Engagement Services; and Prof Michael Adelowotan, UJ - School of Accounting

Congratulations are also due to Dr Futa Osumanu, whose dissertation on managing non-technical power distribution losses in Ghana was co-supervised by Prof Nwulu alongside Prof Clinton Ohis Aigbavboa and Prof. M Somiah.

Dr Esan and Dr Futa, we are incredibly proud of you. Wishing you all the very best in your future endeavours.

01/08/2026

Thank You To Our Speakers |

The Chairholder, Prof Nnamdi Nwulu, and the entire South Africa-Swiss Bilateral Research Chair in Blockchain Technology extend heartfelt gratitude to each of yesterday's speakers, for taking time out of their busy schedules to help reimagine South Africa's supply chains through .

- Prof Trynos Gumbo, Head of School, Civil Engineering and Built Environment, UJ Faculty of Engineering and the Built Environment, University of Johannesburg, for opening the day
- Prof Horst Treiblmaier, Full Professor, Modul University Vienna, for the keynote on blockchain's real-world use cases
- Mr Julian Kanjere, Senior Blockchain Specialist, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), for his session on blockchain as a trust anchor for supply chains
- Dr Richmore Dondofema, Senior Researcher, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), for presenting ILIMA, a blockchain platform built for poultry farmers
- Ms Genevieve Leveille, CEO and Founder, AgriLedger, for her session on scaling blockchain solutions without pricing people out
- Mr Anzill Adams, Founder and CEO, DataLedger, for his session on building blockchain trust across supply chains
- Mr Shadrack Kubyane, CEO and Co-founder, eFama App, for sharing insights on real-world blockchain use cases in South Africa's supply chains during the panel discussion
- Ms Pretty Kubyane, Tech Lead, eFama App, for bringing her expertise to the panel, addressing how technology can help solve basic human needs such as food security
- Mr Blake Player, Chief Commercial Officer, VALR, for joining us as part of the day's line-up

Thank you, all nine of you, for being part of yesterday's line-up.

01/08/2026

Thank You To Our Participants |

The 2026 edition of the annual Media Event held on thursday, 30 July, 2026 drew participants from across finance, supply chain, tech, STEM, non-STEM and legal backgrounds, at every level from undergraduate and postgraduate students to researchers, practitioners and professionals.

They were punctual and attentive throughout, and they made full use of the Q&A sessions to engage directly with our speakers.

During the coffee breaks and lunch, they networked with one another and visited the tables of the businesses that partnered with and spoke at the event.

To everyone who joined us, thank you for the energy, the questions and making the room what it was.

01/08/2026

Thank You To Our Programme Director |

Ms Dimakatso Tshabalala, Administrator of the South Africa-Swiss Bilateral Research Chair in Blockchain Technology, University of Johannesburg, was our Master of Ceremony (MC) for yesterday's media event.

She coordinated the flow of the programme from start to finish, ensuring smooth transitions between sessions and keeping participants engaged throughout. She also gave a branded gift to a lucky attendee who answered her questions correctly.

Ms Dimakatso, thank you for a job well done.

01/08/2026

Panel Discussion: Blockchain Across South Africa's Supply Chains |

Ms Bonolo Moraka, from the South Africa-Swiss Bilateral Research Chair in Blockchain Technology, moderated the panel discussion on how is transforming product flow, information flow and financial infrastructure across South African and African supply chains, from agriculture and w**e to pharma and digital asset liquidity.

On the panel:
- Ms Genevieve Leveille, CEO and Founder of AgriLedger
- Mr Shadrack Kubyane, CEO & Co-Founder of eFama App
- Ms Pretty Kubyane, Tech Lead at eFama App
- Mr Anzill Adams, Founder and CEO of DataLedger

Mr Blake Player, Chief Commercial Officer at VALR, had to leave before the panel began. His expertise on the financial side of blockchain was missed on stage, and we remain grateful he made time to be part of the programme.

Ms Moraka professionally engaged the panellists, asking them a number of real-world application questions to ensure the audience got the best from their expertise. A brief overview of the panel session includes:

Asked what problem each platform solved before arrived, the panel kept returning to trust: it never goes out of fashion, and blockchain has simply revitalised it. When trust leaves the room, trade follows.

On farmers' negotiating power once supply chains go on-chain, the answer came down to participation, inclusion, and making the technology easy to use, however advanced it is underneath.

Asked who is hardest to convince to adopt the tech, the panel's advice was blunt: do not sell the blockchain, solve the problem keeping the user up at night.

Their hope for blockchain in South Africa's supply chains: real blockchain and integration, technology that creates sustainable jobs, and solving food security before tackling harder, more basic human needs.

It was the day's widest-ranging conversation: five voices, one missed, on what it takes to build trust at scale.

01/08/2026

DataLedger and WineLedger: Building Blockchain Trust |

Mr Anzill Adams, Founder and CEO of DataLedger, presented at our Annual Media Event on DataLedger and WineLedger, building blockchain trust across South African supply chains.

During his talk, he walked the participants through the provenance flow, which includes how a product's journey moves from real-world operations, through oracles and , into the record, tracked across production, processing and consumption.

His integration framework connects the informal economy, farmers and their communities, through aggregation and processing management, to the formal economy's digital marketplace, all built around people, planet, product and purpose.

He shared a lesson from experience, which is not to sell the technology but to sell the problem it solves, a line that says as much about entrepreneurship as it does about blockchain.

It was a session that grounded the day's theme in the mechanics of how trust actually gets built, step by step, across a supply chain.

01/08/2026

AgriLedger: Traceability and Farmer Empowerment |

Ms Genevieve Leveille, CEO and Founder of AgriLedger, presented virtually on agricultural traceability and farmer empowerment across Africa.

She started by highlighting problems such as a broken economy, among others, which motivate innovations. She made the case with real AgriLedger projects, including work done with the government of Haiti.

If there's one idea to take from her session, it's this: understanding everyone on the value chain is where a working solution begins.

Underneath the platform sits a handful of hard mechanics such as privacy against the lack of it, the pull of community buy-in, and a constant watch on data reliability if solutions are to scale. All of it is in service of one goal: ensuring the food people eat does not make them sick.

New technology, she said, is how solutions scale without making them too expensive.

It turned the day's big theme into something farmers and consumers alike could actually feel.

Address

University Of Johannesburg, APK
Johannesburg

Telephone

+27115992743

Website

https://blockchain.uj.ac.za/

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