The Caribbean island nation Barbados has become the first to establish a virtual embassy through its partnership with the metaverse platform Decentraland. The deal was inked by the nation’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade to set up the virtual premises in the user-owned, Ethereum-based digital environment. The official launch for the same is scheduled to take place somewhere around January 2022.

Decentraland has already made giant strides in the metaverse space. Nevertheless, the country is planning to further its metaverse ambitions with a series of other partnerships. Its Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade is considering several other blockchain-based agreements with Somnium Space, SuperWorld, and various other companies in the domain.

The partnerships will serve varying purposes, such as ‘E-visas and a ‘teleporter’ to enable swift travel using avatars across virtual worlds.

Barbados’ ambassador to the United Arab Emirates, H.E. Gabriel Abed, said, “We don’t want to pick a winner since the metaverse is still young and new. Additionally, we want to make sure everything we construct is transportable across metaworlds.”

The idea of a metaverse has picked up momentum recently with Facebook’s decision to rebrand itself as Meta, highlighting its shift towards developing emerging technologies. However, in addition to Decentraland, there are several other notable firms in the space, including Axie Infinity, Enjin, The Sandbox, and Illuvium.

Follow us on LinkedIn

Read other Articles