Bitcoin Forum

I interviewed this man today in Zimbabwe:

https://steemit.com/bitcoin/@bitcoinmeister/this-man-sells-his-cattle-for-bitcoin-in-zimbabwe-a-blockchain-summer-school-harare-interview

His contact information is at the link provided.

This is actually a good topic, enjoyed reading/watching it.
Interesting work you are doing, the farmer is nothing like what I would imagine zimbabwan farmer to look :D

keep it up, wish you luck!

Crazy how far bitcoin has come, i wonder how big bitcoin is in zimbabwe for him to make any sales.  Interesting either way.  Thanks

Finaly those africans are figuring out how to stay out of the debt system and banks. Maybe we should contact the guy somehow and make him some bitcoin enterpreneur to teach other africans to stay out of the shit the banks funded them.

In poland there is a proverb - One swallow doesnt make a spring. But maybe there will be more swallows there.

That's actually a pretty good idea, but Im not sure why he wouldnt just sell for normal currency

 Seriously?  This is why:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jun/12/zimbabwe-offers-new-exchange-rate-1-for-35000000000000000-old-dollars

 There is no trust for the Zimbabwe "normal" currency.

haha this was pretty funny.
but i think the real question is if this is a Joke and if he is going to be successful in selling his cattle in the end?!!!

because to be honest i don't see any farmer in a third world country be using bitcoin and wanting to spend it on a cattle!

Honestly it makes total sense that he would do that. They phased out their old currency due to hilarious levels of hyperinflation.
He probably could have some more mobility with Bitcoin though even though Dollar is the normally used currency there now.

but what is the price?

This is really cool! This only means that other people wanted to earn bitcoins than dollars, this only means that dollars can be an international currency but not all people wants to earn dollar. Maybe this man saw the advantage of bitcoins and he wants to invest on bitcoins since its price was continously increasing. Its really amazing that digital currency now are getting more and more popular. I hope this will help the community to become more popular.

I think that is the easiest and safest way for him. If he would sell it for Zimbave money, it would soon be worth nothing because of the immense infaltion. For other foreign currencies he would probably get problems. So Bitcoin is a good choice.

Yeah.. this guy is intelligent. Although the volatility in the Bitcoin exchange rates are well known, nothing can beat the instability of the Zimbabwean Dollar (I think now they have withdrawn the currency). That said, I don't know how he is going to spend his coins. Are there any shops in Zimbabwe which accepts Bitcoin? If there are none, then he may be forced to travel to South Africa to spend his coins.

I think this is a very smart move from this man. Especially when the trust in a currency is very low.

My only concern is that he may have very limited ways of spending the coins. I don't expect every store there to have a bitcoin checkout option for instance.

I believe I read on some newsbtc site that Zimbabwe is in the forefront of making it easier for the public to access bitcoin to have it more readily available so this should not be such a surprise.
They sell goats in the mideast this way already as everybody has a cell phone and internet access via this method nowadays. And yes, even farmers! ::)

Great job, these countries whose native currency is crap really will benefit from using bitcoin,  we need to get the word out.  There could also be a good charitable idea here, where people can send bitcoin to the farm to provide cattle to poor farmers, sorta like crowed funding. 

I had to read it twice to fully understand it. Thought he was selling his castle.  :P

Smart move for the man, since their currency is simply worthless he can protect himself and can even maybe make some money out of this deal. (if he holds ofc)

Well its a amazing feature if you ask me, being able to sell his cattle for bitcoin, and with that be able to save into bitcoin, this is the first person i do believe is doing such, i do hope to see this being applied at the countries where there is more bitcoiner then Zimbabwe.

It's outstanding to see first signs of a local Bitcoin economy in African countries. Especially since it's in the primary economic sector. That's what we need to establish a closed-loop Bitcoin economy, where fiat money becomes entirely obsolete. With an established local Bitcoin marketplace, Bitcoin remittances can go native. Only this way Bitcoin can show its full potential and will be greatly superior than any other money transfer service.

A practical problem to local Bitcoin activity catching on in these countries may be the lack of Bitcoin supply. As there are no mining operations, few tourists and only very little international trade, inflow of Bitcoin will remain very limited and mostly rely on remittances. The huge premiums currently paid for BTC in India clearly exemplify this problem.

ya.ya.yo!

That's an interesting choice, if anything, to be honest. I would expect that someone in a place like Zimbabwe is going to value their cattle or any means of making food or a living more than they would value Bitcoin.

Considering he has access to Bitcoin in the first place I would assume this guy has some status already.

he can make a pool of money if try sells the castle for the common currencies. :D

I may think if the Bitcoin will become an excellent progress for those countries like Zimbabwe.

Well to be honest he didn't have much of a choice. The local currency is beyond screwed and obviously any other fiat will eventually end up in the same situation so bitcoins were a logical choice. It's too bad it has to be a bad situation to switch over from the dark side but hey, whatever gets people over right?

Trust is something only to be given to those that deserve it Zimbabwe currency reached tremendous amounts of hyperinflation so it is no wonder how no one will trust the government and their fiat ever again.

i wonder how much cattle he have and how much if he sell for each cattle? i think he should have hundreds of cattle in his farm so he decided to sell his cattle. its really interesting news because we can know that in zimbabwe, bitcoin is using too and i am amaze by that person for selling his cattle.

Haha. Makes me laugh because they trust bitcoin more than their own currency. Anyway, its really good to see how people recognize bitcoin. Yesterday i saw a post here which a school is accepting bitcoin https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1663682.0. Smart choice for the guy to sell his cattles for btc. Goodluck for him.

That equates to ~27,137 BTC at the current exchange rate, or ~14K head of US cattle, again based on current market conditions. Also, on average $20M = ~8M Happy Meals or = ~227,272 meals at Eddie V's.

i strongly believed that there is a great future in bitcoins. and this is one of the great news bitcoin community. it just goes to show how people nowadays recognize bitcoin and what benefits one can get in keeping them.

Cool! He is one of few people on earth that has discovered the true power and potential of bitcoin. I wish he will be rewarded in future for this wise move and that he will make bitcoin popular among his native community. Bitcoin is changing the world!

Being should it will not become problem in the future for him because of sells his cattle for bitcoins and being should he has done calculating about the risk to making investment into bitcoins and be ready lost of value in bitcoin.

The problem is, South Africa also do not have loads of merchants accepting Bitcoin. I have friends there and they are saying it is nearly non-existent in that country. Apart from a few online Art & craft specialty Bitcoin items, it has nearly no support. I Googled it, and I only found some news that a online retailer called TakeAlot is accepting Bitcoin.

I visited the site, but you have to sign up with a 3rd party payment processor to be able to buy stuff at that site and it seems like you have to be a retailer to do that. I wanted to buy some gifts for them, and had it delivered locally. ^hmmmm^ 

I read "castle" instead of "cattle" so I opened the link and was expecting too see a castle lol

Great idea, good to see people opening door for bitcoin and bitcoin opening doors for people.

Nice informative and engaging steemit post.

Bitcoin as we all know it is a good store of value because of its disinflationary model, and it is already showing across the world. It is also so convenient and so useful to the unbanked populations across the world.

Crowdfunding to help develop Africans bitcoin infrastructure is such an excelent idea. The africa has the resources and people. They just dont have the money because their currencies are close to useless. All of their money goes to pay enourmous debt. If only they would use the money that government dont use to pay debts it would mean a second chance to Africa.

Bitcoin fighting world hunger. You know how powerful the campaign could be?

You know.. that's a smart guy. His Fiat in his country probably sucks. If i was him i would have done the same thing. I mean you can buy anything with bitcoin these days or sell for cash no problem. To sell cows for bitcoin just shows how the world is changing and bitcoin is the future in currency  or is already here.

yes it's true that local currency on Zimbabwe has no valuable even some people have thousand billions of dollar Zimbabwe but that even could not use to buying a kilo of apples or a cabbage so this country have serious problem regarding inflation economy but i think bitcoin also will not change situations at there it is too complex moreover the officials at there was very like corruption

Considering the current state of affairs in Zimbabwe, I should warn this guy against giving any sort of publicity for the sale. Considering the string of asset forfeitures going on in Zimbabwe, I wouldn't be much surprised if the government try to seize his coins. 

This is one of the unusual way to get a bitcoin.
This one should be on the news now. I mean really now.  ;D

Well there is always a possibility that there is at least a few of them.  FYI, technology is not limited to those who are in front of the computer.  Even if his job is a farmer, there is a possibility that he can be more advance/ updated in technology than us.  And besides Bitcoin is a currency and cattle is considered as goods, so i don't find anything wrong if some person wanted to buy a cattle with bitcoin.

That's a step forward in the growth of bitcoin as well a positive response in a country where the currency has lost its value. Now in this worse financial situation if bitcoin is accepted as their countries own country, then can expect good growth in bitcoin as well in the country's economics situation.

I think the guy have sold for the value and the stability in bitcoin. You need to remember this country has hyperinflation with the fiat currency. You can do a search on google and type one hundred's trillion dollar zimbabwe currency and you will see for yourself.

When bitcoin meet Zimbawe , it's gonna be a good help for them especially when their economy fundamental are really weak
With this event, bitcoin become 1 more step ahead becoming world wide known currency and the only one internet currency that ever exist

It's pretty amazing to see how far bitcoin has come and this move is going to help that man in finding money for his living with that corrupt government. More people in poor and corrupt countries should follow his example.

I like to read such good news. It's good to see that Bitcoin is spreading through the world, even in less developed country. Bitcoin could realy be one of the means to help to the people and countries in Africa and elsewhere. Who says that new high level technologies couldn't be used in the whole world for any purpose.

Damn, $1 equals 35,000,000,000,000,000 Zimbabwe dollars.
With bitcoin they don't need to have a lot of fiat , bringing lot of them to the market, seriously?? with $100 trillion in Zimbabwe you don't even buy a candy bar. Bitcoin might not help economic situation out there at least they don't have to bringing lot of cash if they want to buy something however it constrained by lack of adoption of the bitcoin out there.

People will follow him in those kind of countries.
In the beginning of the video, he says that there are a lot of problems people are facing when using Western Union and regular bank transfers.

Once word gets out that Bitcoin is an easier means of transferring money, a lot of people will use that over other services like Western Union when the word gets out.
A lot of people send money back to their families, so it's a whole new market.

It could be a "good" news, but who wants to live in Zimbabwe? I mean, the country has a lot of problems (I was in other side of Africa and situation is very "strange", it's the only thing i can tell) and I think that be the owner of a bunch of cattle is not "so good as it seems" (if it seems...), be a merchant witha very fckd up currency could be a barrier to do everything linked with economy... I prefer a fcked life where I am living now. But taking this idea off (about the country itself), the attitude is pretty noble. But, however, all I know about Zimbabwe is the extreme inflation rates and people using very colorful clothes.

They have crazy inflation and their unstable economy won't help them achieve better FIAT status any time soon. But I don't think Bitcoin could cure for their problems.
It is still too soon to use Bitcoin as FIAT replacement in everyday life - and certainly not in poorly developed country like Zimbabwe.
As far as I know Zimbabwe is currently using US Dollars as their currency. I still think it is better option than BTC, at least for now.

Yes unfortunately the paper money in Zimbabwe is basically worthless.
Most people, especially those in rural areas, are not going to have access to computers/ internet, so Bitcoin won't be an option for them.
One day it may be a possibility, but the idea of BTC being something that can help people in these situations is a long way off.

I think that this is a thoughtless and foolish, because a person can lose everything.

Livestock market is really big in any countries and use of bitcoin in this unique field can boom the demand of bitcoin. Trading livestock for bitcoin in one way may help those farmers to know about bitcoin along with they may find it interesting if they can book some profit by just holding those bitcoins.

That's a brilliant use of Bitcoin for cattle owners and farmers. Zimbabwe's economic crisis and their currency devaluation (their currency is almost in millions of currency notes and almost worth very very less) can foster Bitcoin usage for even the poor and boost remittances. I hope the Bitcoin exchange that they were talking about in the video does get setup in Zimbabwe, this would save a lot of time for the locals to purchase Bitcoin and make use of it.

Definitely a nice move and a start of innovation! If Zimbabwean folks start the adoption on using bitcoin as one of the accepted medium of payment, then other people too in the world would soon realize the advantages of using bitcoin as a payment medium and it's potential investment capabilities. Good job, dude! Hope that most people follow suit.

This is really interesting article and it's thoughtful of sharing it with us. Considering Zimbabwe currency it's easy to understand why he did it and it's a good move. This is a example and it could inspire others way to go.

Amazing that someone can sells cattle for bitcoin this is new generation and advantage of technology.. and i think this is not new because before i heard that someone are offering here like pizza for bitcoin.. and it s amazing who are receive many bitcoins before i think he is rich by now..
The adoption of bitcoin right now is growing.. and more people right now are knows about bitcoin.

this is like barter all over again, so no surprise seeing it in a country where the poverty is everywhere, their fiat currency is not valuable at all it's trash so it's more wise to acquire bitcoin there, and i'm expecting this for all the other poor country as well

Wow such person are using bitcoin and here in my country even educated and highly experienced computer teacher also don't know about bitcoin shame on my countries citizen. When would you grow up old man.

LOl old man never grow up but I'm sure they can learn.


Honestly, I was shocked when i known about the current  price of dollar in their local currency.  Though I agree with the one who commented that dollar is better be used than bitcoin, but i think  it is always better if they can try to use other currency such as bitcoin so they will know the difference.


This is the main concern for bitcoin adoption in Zimbabwe.  There maybe a few thousands that can afford computers, but majority that of those that actually need help and support for their living will have a small chance to get benefits from bitcoin due to their limited resources.

This man selling cattle can mean two things. If he is a typical farmer it means that our world is getting stabolizes, so people believe in science and abstract things, because it is really stupid to sell something real and usefit for ideal and doubtful in crisis. If he isn't then it is just him being crazy when other people are a lot more careful.

Perhaps we should make an effort towards marketing Bitcoin towards Zimbabwe. Considering their currency is pretty much toilet paper, their people may be very open to the idea of wealth preservation and free trade. I think is harder for first world countries to adopt Bitcoin because we are accustomed to having relatively stable currencies.

They don't have a national currency now. The Zimbabwean Dollar was withdrawn in April 2009. Now they are using a large number of foreign currencies instead (mostly the South African Rand and the United States Dollar, but also Botswana Pula, GBP, Indian Rupee, Euro, Japanese Yen, and the Australian Dollar). If we push hard.... then Bitcoin can become the national currency of Zimbabwe. 

i think its good deal that he want to sell his cattle for bitcoin and i think we can use bitcoin with easily and if someone send bitcoin to this person if someone is same country of this cattleman then its possible.

Yeah using Bitcoin for the payment currency is such a good option especially if he'd live in Zimbabwe. Their currency fluctuation is overwhelming. I guess no one is going to lift 1 kilogramme of money for a cattle instead of using bitcoin with ease. just hand him a phone and everything will be fine

Bitcoin seems to be everywhere. The problem is that not everyone is using it. I think it will take a long time and will be very slow for more mainstream adoption.

That’s great, we must support and promote such activities because the movement of bitcoin from one point to another also brings more users in some cases so we can safely say that movement is growth. We should try to promote bitcoin wherever possible because that’s the way we can strengthen our community and bitcoin. More users, more usage and ultimately more value (not price). Thanks for coming up with this interview.

this is interesting and weird at the same time.
what kind of farmer is trading livestock with bitcoin, and the weird part is not actually about wanting to do it with bitcoin, it is with where he is, Zimbabwe!!!

What an outstanding move! :D
Zimbabwe is a poor country. The economy is in collapse and the welfare is so piteous. People are in poor and starving. And his decision could change his life. Bitcoin is a good investment to have. It might change his life into a better one.

Why s this strange? Bitcoin is money and the farmer wants money for his livestock. The best reason to accept Bitcoin instead of his local

currency is that his local currency are failing and he is seeing that. Why sell a cow for $10 000 Zim Dollar today, just to see that the value of

that $10 000 Zim Dollar evaporate with every bad decision the government makes? The Bitcoin price is purely determined by supply &

demand, not what some government wants it to be.  ::)

Even prior to all these farmland seizures, a large part of the Zimbabwean population lived in poverty. It is true that the economy has completely collapsed. But the remittance payments from South Africa and Botswana is helping the middle class to stay afloat. Also, the agricultural production seems to be rising again, after a long period of decline.

I think we should not be surprised for that as we already know that bitcoin is present in all over the world and if he is selling his cattle for buying bitcoin, maybe he has some extra cattle that we want to sell, as bitcoin can give him some good profit therefore he may have taken that decision. Heartfully I like to appreciate him, I always love people who are investing into bitcoins.

Its not already surprising for me since i do expect already that bitcoin is already on some parts of the world which means adoption is really increasing and that man who sell off his cattle for bitcoin is somehow a  good decision on this current state of bitcoin since its not too late to invest with it. You are right maybe he have still cattle left and just tending to try up bitcoin.

wow, how did the man even hear about bitcoin in the first place? This guy is very creative for doing that, but I don't see how he can use those bitcoins in Zimbabwe. How does he buy food/clothes there? Maybe he sells them for both bitcoin and his currency.