SVRI Forum – Reflections
As a young researcher, the SVRI Forum 2024 in Cape Town, South Africa, was truly a phenomenal experience to take in.
The Forum is the world’s biggest gathering of researchers and practitioners working to end sexual and gender-based violence in all its facets. There were over 1500 researchers, practitioners, and service providers presenting their work, focusing on varied demographics through multiple approaches. It was both inspirational as well as humbling to see the vast global network focused upon this field.
The community around the Forum was open, always ready to welcome new people, and ready to share experiences and learnings. More than anything, it was the influx of learning opportunities that was near-overwhelming, but excellent to receive.
As a networking opportunity, there was an immense amount of access to funders, local organizations, and INGOs who were very open to connecting about future work and opportunities.
At an organizational and management level, the Forum itself was a great learning experience. Self-care experiences were built into the program, acknowledging the difficult subject matter being dealt with. There were designated quiet spaces for calls and unwinding. Sessions had real-time artwork being created, mirroring the work, conversations, and participant quotes from sessions. Numerous other small details were skillfully inserted into the proceedings, making participants’ experiences both informative and smooth.
For our own work, the Forum was the ideal place to be inspired and motivated. We were at the Forum in the early stages of our own project with SVRI: an ambitious and innovative project to embed Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) prevention in the local health system of Sri Lanka, working with the Family Health Bureau of the Ministry of Health of Sri Lanka and the SVRI. The sheer amount of global research on IPV prevention that focuses on building evidence and scaling up programmes that have been scientifically proven to work was staggering and underlined to us the importance of aligning with the global community and research in this battle.
In general, the Forum was an inspiring and motivational experience that really spoke to me as someone just setting out on their journey in this field, connecting me to a global network of people as well as to a global evidence base that will only help me, as well as Chrysalis, moving forward.
