Marijke Verpoorten is a professor at the IOB – Institute for Development Policy and Management, University of Antwerp. She is also affiliated with CEGEMI (Université Catholique de Bukavu – DR Congo), the African School of Economics (ASE-Benin), and LICOS (KULeuven). Marijke obtained a PhD in economics from the University of Leuven. Her research focuses on the causes and consequences of armed conflict, natural resources, global supply chains, and more broadly, on the economic and institutional development of Sub-Saharan Africa. Marijke has publications in the Journal of Conflict Resolution, Food Policy, Journal of Applied Econometrics, Journal of Peace Research, Political Geography, and the Journal of Development Economics among others.