The Jamaican Senate has enacted a law establishing the country’s central bank digital currency (CBDC), called the Jamaica Digital Exchange or Jam-Dex, as legal tender. This, after the Bank of Jamaica (BOJ) carried out the pilot tests between May and December 2021.
The Minister of Relations and Foreign Trade, Kamina Johnson, said during her intervention in the Jamaican parliament, that she hopes that the implementation of the CBDC reduce the rate of people who are not bankedaccording to reported Jamaica News Agency.
The official clarified that people will not need to open a bank account to access the digital currency.
What they will now have [los usuarios] it is a wallet for CBDC, which will be issued by banks or authorized payment service providers, with simpler and more customer-friendly processes, in order to facilitate access”, detailed Johnson.
The new law also expands the definition of legal tender to include virtual tokens as well. The use of physical banknotes and coins will not be affected either..
Taking ground from bitcoin in Jamaica
The CBDC project, which has been working on for several years, has among its objectives to discourage the use of bitcoin (BTC) on the island, where it is expected that, in five years, the 70% of its population adopts the so-called Jamaican dollaras CriptoNoticias reported a few months ago.
It is important to remember that central bank digital currencies are controlled by governments, unlike Bitcoin.
Incentives for use of the CBDC
Prior to the launch of Jam-Dex, the Government of Jamaica in an attempt to encourage the use of digital currency, reported that the first 100,000 people to download the wallet for the digital currency would receive USD 2,500last March.
“We will incentivize neighborhood stores and informal and formal community businesses to establish e-wallets and facilitate payments on Jam-Dex,” detailed Chancellor of the Exchequer Nigel Clarke.
The case of Jamaica puts the Caribbean region at the forefront of promoting and developing CBDCs, along with the Bahamas, a country that has already launched its own digital currency.
The Sand Dollar as the digital currency of the Bahamas was called, was a initiative undertaken by the central bank of the island and currently can be accepted by anyone with a wallet approved by the regulatory financial institution.