The VOI has been validated in practice. Two pilot projects have been completed in Guinea-Bissau with the UNDP to promote peaceful coexistence between communities divided by land disputes.
The projects were funded by the Peacebuilding Fund and yielded outstanding results (98% of community-sourced indicators of success improved significantly from the baseline).
The root causes of the conflict (the problem):
At the start of the VOI pilot, the villages had been involved in violent incidents for three years. The outbreak of violence between the villages of Iungum and Sum occurred after a period of escalation whose crux concerned rice-farming lands. The villages subsisted based on rice, their main source of food and income. In the aftermath of the confrontations, the communities grew divided and stopped farming the rice fields to avoid further deaths. Without farming the rice fields, their dire socioeconomic situation continued to worsen.
Reaching consensus with the VOI (the solution):
Through initial community consultations, the VOI was a welcomed external push that would allow communities to reclaim the ownership of their (integrated) future. As the project evolved, the community-led efforts were effective in renewing a sense of social cohesion. The VOI exercises led to overlapping consensus between the villages and their different groups on an economic and a social idea: on the one hand, communities agreed that it would be fundamental to rehabilitate the rice fields to improve the lives of all; on the other hand, joint football tournaments and traditional dance festivals were seen as key renewing inter-communal relationships. As a result, in Phase III, communities autonomously implemented the socioeconomic interventions.
To rehabilitate the dikes, we sponsored a visit from an agrarian engineer and provided funds to purchase tubes to ensure the irrigation of the fields. The communities organised themselves to work on the rice fields in mixed shifts: as the VOI team visited the project site, we found the village chiefs working side-by-side over the sound of a small radio to the benefit of all.
The football tournament also showcased the ethos of the VOI project. Without explicit guidance, communities decided to host the tournament with mixed teams, instead of having the villages play against one another.
The VOI impact (the results):
The results of this pilot were exceptional. The evolution of the community-sourced indicators evaluating peaceful coexistence across the VOI pilots was extremely positive, both overall and across each social dimension.
These two pilots allowed to bring peaceful coexistence and improve the lives of the four communities involved in the projects.
Read more about our VOI project in Guinea-Bissau on the UNDP website here.
Our mission is to replicate this meaningful positive social impact created by VOI in Guinea-Bissau to other fragile and vulnerable areas, countries and communities in the world!
If you would like to partner up with us in our mission, reach out to us and book a 15-30min video call.
