Billion People Problems

Like the name suggests, Billion People Problems are systemic, large-scale issues that threaten the well-being, dignity, and survival of a billion or more people. These problems span environmental, social, political, technological, and economic domains. It is all around us.

For example water shortage is one of them, in 2025 more than 2 Billion humans across the world face water risk in some form or the other. All of the Billion People Problems stem from some form of broken coordination between the different actors responsible. Pollution, Poverty, Inequality, Energy Shortage are some of the other Billion People problems, find the exhaustive list below.

In this piece we will look at all the major Billion People problems and categorize different "coordination failure" types. Our intention with this piece is to help anyone facing one of these problems to imagine how Anchor Protocol can help them tackle it. The team at Dropchain has decades of hands-on experience designing solutions to these problems and have helped millions of humans overcome the Billion people predicament.

With many of these problems now hitting tipping points we realised the need to accelerate our work, which inspired us to build Anchor Protocol. Anchor Protocol is an open auditable coordination protocol which apps, dashboards, and other digital interfaces leverage to solve coordination issues.

From 2019 to 2021 we powered an app called Hydrop which was powered by the first version of Anchor. Hydrop helped over 11,000 people in the city of Bangalore coordinate and tackle safe water shortage leveraging a bottoms up water marketplace, this is how we deal with a billion people problem, by coordinating better. Since then many different interfaces have been built on Anchor. From interfaces to help farmers in Brazil tackle food shortage to helping villages in Rural India get better access to water. We have cities in Africa and Latin America leveraging Anchor Protocol to build micro economies which are sustained by rooftop solar and hydroponics. Many such stories of hope.

We coined the term "billion people problems" as a category to spotlight the urgent need to solve these challenges, it needs many innovations both private and public. The purpose of Anchor Protocol is to aid these thousands, maybe millions of interfaces to tackle these pressing problems that many of us face.

The Global Risks we face in the next 2-10 years

🌍 Environmental & Climate

Water Scarcity – Over 2 billion people lack access to safe drinking water.
Air Pollution – Affects 90% of the global population, causing millions of deaths annually.
Soil Degradation – Threatens food security and affects over 3.2 billion people.
Deforestation & Biodiversity Loss – Disrupts ecosystems vital to planetary health.
Climate Shocks – Floods, droughts, and heatwaves displacing populations and disrupting livelihoods.
Plastic & Chemical Pollution – Microplastics and toxins are now in food, water, and human bloodstreams.

Social & Economic

1. Poverty – Over 700 million people live on less than $2/day; economic inequality continues to widen.
Food Insecurity – Affects over 2.4 billion people globally.
Unemployment & Underemployment – Especially among youth in developing economies.
Lack of Access to Quality Education – 260 million children are out of school; many more receive low-quality education.
Gender Inequality – Impacts economic participation, safety, and education for over half the population.
Mass Displacement & Statelessness – Driven by war, climate, and economic collapse.

Urbanization & Infrastructure

Slum Living & Unaffordable Housing – Over 1 billion people live in informal settlements.
Traffic Congestion & Poor Public Transport – Costing trillions in productivity and emissions.
Waste Management Crisis – Overflowing landfills, e-waste, and lack of circular systems.

Health & Well-being

Pandemics & Disease Surveillance Gaps – Poor preparedness and access to care.
Mental Health Crisis – Affecting 1 in 4 people, especially post-COVID.
Malnutrition & Lifestyle Diseases – A double burden affecting billions: obesity and undernourishment.
Lack of Access to Healthcare – Billions lack affordable and reliable healthcare.

Governance & Coordination

Corruption & Institutional Breakdown – Erodes trust, slows development.
Misinformation & Breakdown of Public Trust – Erodes democratic processes.
Lack of Global Coordination on Shared Problems – From climate to pandemics, fragmented efforts fail billions.

Technology & Access

Digital Divide – Billions still lack access to the internet or digital literacy.
Surveillance Capitalism & Data Exploitation – Loss of autonomy and rising manipulation.
AI Bias & Technological Inequity – Excludes large parts of the world from the benefits of innovation.

Energy & Resources

Energy Poverty – Nearly 1 billion people lack access to electricity.
Dependence on Fossil Fuels – Leading to conflict, emissions, and fragile supply chains.
Unsustainable Supply Chains – Exploiting labor and resources in the Global South.

Patterns we observed

We spent countless hours in the trenches, co-building and learning from young and experienced leaders who have dedicated years in pursuit of tackling these issues.

From years of pattern recognition we have found major underlying themes. Patterns similar across most billion people problems, these themes are crucial as it helps humanity design comprehensive solutions which let us do more with less.

Below are the primary 8 patterns, and some examples of how they play out in the world, around us. Everyday.

Pattern #1

Resource Allocation Failures

The right resources don’t reach the right people at the right time.

Water scarcity in flood-prone areas.

Energy poverty despite abundant sun/wind.

Surplus food wasted while millions go hungry.

Pattern #2

Accountability & Trust Failures

People don’t trust systems, institutions, or each other enough to cooperate at scale.

Corruption in governance and aid.

Misinformation undermining climate action or public health.

Greenwashing and fake ESG claims.

Pattern #3

Incentive Misalignment.

What’s profitable is often destructive; what’s regenerative is often thankless.

Water scarcity in flood-prone areas.

Energy poverty despite abundant sun/wind.

Surplus food wasted while millions go hungry.

Pattern #4

Information & Sensemaking Failures

People can’t access, process, or agree on what’s true.

Data silos

Lack of shared maps

Slow Signals

Pattern #5

Infrastructure & Accessibility Failures

Solutions exist, but they don’t reach the communities that need them most.

Rural villages off-grid despite national electrification programs.

Medicines available globally but unaffordable or logistically blocked locally.

Digital divide leaving billions excluded from online education and finance.

Pattern #6

Resilience vs. Regeneration Gap

Short-term survival is prioritized while long-term thriving is ignored.

Relief camps set up after floods, but no watershed restoration to prevent recurrence.

Drought aid without investment in rainwater harvesting or soil health.

Energy grids reinforced after blackouts, but no shift to decentralized renewables.

Pattern #7

Coordination Failures

Actors work in silos, duplicating efforts and missing collective leverage.

Multiple NGOs running similar projects in the same region without collaboration.

Governments, private sector, and communities working at cross-purposes.

Fragmented climate data platforms that don’t interoperate.

Pattern #8

Liquidity & Market Failures

Value exists but cannot be translated into usable capital or incentives.

Farmers regenerating soil can’t monetize ecosystem services.

Waste pickers reducing landfill load aren’t financially recognized.

Billions in pledged climate finance stuck in bureaucratic pipelines.

Like the name suggests, Billion People Problems are systemic, large-scale issues that threaten the well-being, dignity, and survival of a billion or more people. These problems span environmental, social, political, technological, and economic domains. It is all around us.

For example water shortage is one of them, in 2025 more than 2 Billion humans across the world face water risk in some form or the other. All of the Billion People Problems stem from some form of broken coordination between the different actors responsible. Pollution, Poverty, Inequality, Energy Shortage are some of the other Billion People problems, find the exhaustive list below.

In this piece we will look at all the major Billion People problems and categorize different "coordination failure" types. Our intention with this piece is to help anyone facing one of these problems to imagine how Anchor Protocol can help them tackle it. The team at Dropchain has decades of hands-on experience designing solutions to these problems and have helped millions of humans overcome the Billion people predicament.

With many of these problems now hitting tipping points we realised the need to accelerate our work, which inspired us to build Anchor Protocol. Anchor Protocol is an open auditable coordination protocol which apps, dashboards, and other digital interfaces leverage to solve coordination issues.

From 2019 to 2021 we powered an app called Hydrop which was powered by the first version of Anchor. Hydrop helped over 11,000 people in the city of Bangalore coordinate and tackle safe water shortage leveraging a bottoms up water marketplace, this is how we deal with a billion people problem, by coordinating better. Since then many different interfaces have been built on Anchor. From interfaces to help farmers in Brazil tackle food shortage to helping villages in Rural India get better access to water. We have cities in Africa and Latin America leveraging Anchor Protocol to build micro economies which are sustained by rooftop solar and hydroponics. Many such stories of hope.

We coined the term "billion people problems" as a category to spotlight the urgent need to solve these challenges, it needs many innovations both private and public. The purpose of Anchor Protocol is to aid these thousands, maybe millions of interfaces to tackle these pressing problems that many of us face.