Two schools are about to receive $10,000 worth of musical instruments this week personally delivered by some of New Zealand's top musicians.

Stan Walker, Sons of Zion and Kings are visiting two Rotorua schools - Western Heights Primary School and Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Hurungaterangi - tomorrow to donate $10,000 worth of musical instruments as part of new NFT community initiative.

The Rotorua schools were named as the successful recipients of the music package this week following a nomination and voting process.

The donation to the community is part of a new NFT platform called Eager Beaver.

The New Zealand platform, which is the brainchild of Sons of Zion founding member and Rotorua local Riapo Panapa, was launched in March.

Panapa says the schools were blown away when they found out they had been selected,

'They couldn't believe they had won or were even nominated in the first place. The Western Heights Primary School Principal said the visit would be an exciting one for his students who would get a huge buzz from the visit.”

The new Eager Beaver platform was formed as a way for New Zealand artists to continue their creative work following the tough times that the Covid-19 epidemic inflicted on the music and live events industries.

It allowed musicians to take better control of their art and change the way fans interacted with their favourite artists and creators, says Panapa.

NFT stands for non-fungible token and is a unique digital certificate that contains distinguishing information, which means there is only one and ownership is easily verifiable.

Panapa describes NFTs as 'the future of business and trading” and says he's looking forward to seeing more Kiwis and Māori in particular in the NFT space.

Unlike streaming platforms and distribution agreements with music labels, artists in the Eager Beaver platform will receive the lion's share of the royalties made from any content and music they release as an NFT with the project, he says.

The rest is distributed to the community as royalties and opportunities to give back through kaupapa such as the instruments to schools donation.

'This is a community initiative led by our Eager Beaver community. It's been overwhelming to see the submissions come through and read through the individual stories for each deserving school, and we are looking forward to representing every one of them when we do the instrument drop off at the two successful schools.”

On top of the rights to a unique Eager Beaver NFT, investors will also receive artist royalties, royalties from live events, AAA festival experiences, time in the studio with artists and royalties from up-and-coming artists launched by the platform.

To build the platform, Panapa engaged the skills and expertise of two of his childhood friends - Rotorua based electrical engineer Tim Wiringi, and financial advisor Kereopa Nepata, who has spent the past 17 years working for large Australasian financial institutions.

A total of six schools were shortlisted including Kaitaia's Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Pukemiro, Te Kura Māori o Ngā Tapuwae in Mangere, Triple 5 Rangatahi in Gisborne, Te Kura o Ngāti Haua in Pukemoremore in the Waikato as well as the winning Western Heights Primary School and Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Hurungaterangi, both of which are in Rotorua.

Through a voting process, existing owners of Eager Beaver NFTs selected the two schools they felt most deserved a boost of $10,000 worth of musical instruments.

-Stuff/Annemarie Quill.