Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, says that he will sell $6 billion worth of Tesla stock and donate it to the United Nations (UN). However, he says he will only do this if the UN will be completely transparent and open about how the money will be spent.
Musk, who is the co-founder of Tesla and SpaceX, has recently gained $122.3 billion – taking his net worth to $311 billion. And according to the Bloomberg index, Elon Musk is the first person to achieve such a large fortune.
UN challenges billionaires to donate
The Executive Director of the UN World Food Programme, David Beasley, recently challenged Musk, Jeff Bezos, and other billionaires during a CNN interview. In the interview, he calls on them to step up on “a one-time basis” to help end world hunger.
During the interview, Beasley said that billionaires could give “$6 billion to help 42 million people that are literally going to die if we don’t reach them.”
In response, Musk took to Twitter and responded to the challenge. He offered the UN $6 billion if they could prove how it would solve world hunger. He also added that it should be open-source accounting so that the public can see how the money is spent.
Beasley replied to Musk’s request, saying that he can assure the billionaire that the WFP has the appropriate systems in place for transparency and open source accounting.
“Your team can review and work with us to be totally confident of such,” he said.
$6 Billion won’t solve world hunger
Beasley further added that $6 billion will not actually world hunger, however, it can save 42 million people from starvation.
“$6 billion will not solve world hunger, but it WILL prevent geopolitical instability, mass migration and save 42 million people on the brink of starvation. An unprecedented crisis and a perfect storm due to Covid/conflict/climate crises.”
It remains to be seen whether anything will come from this conversation, however, it did create a “massive global conversation” around world hunger and what $6 billion might be able to achieve.