Chinese Province Unveils Digital Yuan Adoption Plan & City Says ‘All’ Buses Now Accept CBDC

Chinese provinces are continuing to push digital yuan adoption, with the central bank digital currency (CBDC) set to find new uses in the worlds of education and public transport.

Per the media outlet Do News, the coastal province of Jiangsu has promised to launch a platform that will allow citizens to pay education fees.

They will also be able to use it to pay exam fees.

The province says it will launch the platform before the end of the year.

The Jiangsu Provincial Department of Education also said that it would enable scholarship grants to be paid out in the CBDC.

The province added that it wanted to “comprehensively promote” the digital yuan pilot work “in the education field.”

It added that each provincial-level school will be required to “promote at least one digital yuan application project.”

And, by the end of 2025, Jiangsu said, the digital yuan will be enabled as a payments tool for the “entire” sector.

China’s Digital Yuan Pilot: Can It Break Ground in Education, Transport Sectors?

Meanwhile, the city of Jiangmen, in Guangdong Province, Southern China, says its whole bus network will incorporate digital yuan payments.

Per Jiangmen News Network, Jiangmen Bus, the state-owned firm that operates the city’s public buses, school buses, and park transport systems, has announced that digital yuan payments will now be accepted on all buses.

The operator said that CBDC wallet holders could enjoy “full digital yuan coverage” when paying their fares on the city’s buses as of this month.

The city made the announcement after successfully piloting the program on a number of routes serving factories and schools.

Buses in Jianmen have been updated with new software that allows card readers to scan QR codes from digital yuan wallets.

China’s war chest: how Beijing is using its currency to insulate against future sanctions https://t.co/HzyFloCHv5

— The Guardian (@guardian) May 8, 2023

Earlier this month, the Chinese arm of the French bank BNP Paribas and the Chinese state-owned Bank of China announced a digital yuan partnership.

The parties said the deal would allow BNP Paribas China’s corporate clients to pay in digital yuan via a CBDC management platform.