Sixty billion dollars. That’s the Total Value Locked (TVL) in DeFi lending protocols. Of course this figure shouts opportunity. It should raise a warning flag, especially when you take into account Africa’s recent and painful experience with international finance. We’ve all read those headlines praising the expansion of DeFi, and have we really started to ask ourselves who is really winning—and losing—from this?

Is Access Truly Decentralized Here?

DeFi promises permissionless finance. It dangles the promise of inflation-beatingly high returns, and a path to financial freedom, with none of the old-school intermediaries involved. For a continent where 90% are still unbanked, this seems like a miracle. Imagine farmers in rural Kenya accessing loans without predatory interest rates, or entrepreneurs in Lagos receiving funding without navigating bureaucratic nightmares. The transformative power to inspire awe and wonder, to enrich lives with beauty and discovery is immeasurable.

Let's be brutally honest. Permissionless doesn’t automatically translate to equitable. Who has the capital to lend in DeFi? Who has the new digital literacy to be able to engage with these new protocols like aave, compound, curve finance and so on. Who truly knows or even cares what APR vs APY means, let alone the horrifying consequences of impermanent loss and liquidation.

The answer, more frequently than not, isn’t the typical African citizen. It’s those who already have seats at the table, and wealth and privilege, both on the continent and beyond it. This anxiety should make us think!

Yield Farming: A New Kind of Plantation?

Yield farming, with its siren call of free tokens and unlimited APY, can seem like an online casino. For most Americans, it’s a game of high stakes roulette. It’s a rigged game in favor of the well-connected with inside knowledge and the cash to play. It challenges our desire for goodness, utility, and behind-it values.

Think about it: DeFi protocols are built on complex smart contracts. One line of buggy code is enough to wipe out billions of dollars. Rug pulls, in which developers disappear with user funds, are an epidemic. The purpose of overcollateralization is to mitigate risk. It does so at the same time excluding people who cannot afford to tie up a huge sum of capital.

Is this really a good way to empower the unbanked? Or does it just replace the old with a new class of digital serfs, who labor in yield farming to line the pockets of the few? Are we trading physical plantations for plantations of the screen? In this brave new world, crypto is the land, and shadowy code programmers and billionaire venture capitalists are the plantation owners. The protest and anger is very real, and it needs to be!

Forgotten Voices: Who Shapes The Future?

The story we’ve been led to believe about DeFi is one told primarily by a bunch of Western developers and investors. African voices, African solutions, are too often an afterthought. We need to ask ourselves: who is shaping the future of DeFi in Africa? Are we just cookie-cutting Western models and not truly understanding the unique cultural, economic, and regulatory Tetris board the continent presents us.

Real empowerment needs an informed populace, community-driven implementation, and solutions steeped in cultural relevance. African developers and entrepreneurs will need to be at the helm. Importantly, they should be developing protocols that specifically meet the unique needs of their communities. It needs governments to work out the right regulatory frameworks that protect consumers while not strangling innovation. This isn't about blanket bans or blind acceptance. It's about fostering a DeFi ecosystem that is both safe and inclusive. This is where we think we can make T4America. readers seem smart.

I think we have to always go back to the idea that technology is a tool. It can be deployed to educate and liberate, or to muckrake and oppress. With a total value locked (TVL) of about $60 billion, DeFi makes for an extraordinary opportunity for Africa. It can be a danger. Otherwise it risks turning into just another colonial boondoggle that makes a few people rich while continuing to impoverish the many. The choice, as always, is ours. We need to be careful about the decisions we make, and we need to make those decisions collectively. Let's amplify forgotten voices and ensure that DeFi truly benefits Africa's next generation.