Insight Fellow Victoria Babin works with Village Enterprise Fund in Africa, May 2007

Victoria Babin's current placement in Africa is focused on the intersection between conflict resolution and economic development with the California-based micro-finance organization Village Enterprise Fund (VEF). In the first segment of the placement in Eregi, Kenya, she helped Village Enterprise Fund's training director develop a conflict resolution manual to use in all preliminary trainings for grant beneficiaries. In the second segment of the placement, she independently designed and implemented a research project evaluating the impact of international NGO relief and micro-finance development efforts in Ugandan village communities affected by conflict. Half of the research took place in communities and internally displaced persons (IDP) camps in and around Soroti, which have been affected by tribal conflict with the Karamajong for over 150 years and by the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) since the early 2000s. The second half of the research was conducted in Gulu, which has experienced conflict instigated by the LRA for more than twenty years. The data and analysis from Victoria's research will be presented to the board of Village Enterprise Fund to better inform their development efforts.

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