Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) have been defined by the World Bank as ‘private organizations that pursue activities to relieve suffering, promote the interests of the poor, protect the environment, provide basic social services, or undertake community development’. NGO activities can be local, national or international.

NGOs have contributed to the development of communities around the world and are important partners of many governments – while remaining independent from governments. According to the Human Development Report , there were in 2002 over 37,000 NGOs in the world, a growth of 19.3% from 1990.

Their purposes differ but overall two categories dominate: economic development and infrastructure (26%) and research (23%) http://www.globalpolicy.org/ngos/role/intro/growth2000.htm.

NGOs are generally regarded as valued partners in health research for development, research being viewed as a broad process involving not only the production of knowledge, but also up-stream and down-stream activities needed for its relevance and effectiveness, such as priority setting and knowledge translation.

NGOs have made and continue to make substantive contributions through supporting relevant and effective research.

In her address at the First Steering Committee Meeting of the International Conference on Health Research for Development in 1999, the (then) Director General of the World Health Organization (WHO), Dr. Gro Harlem Brundtland, voiced her appreciation of NGOs as a partner with WHO in health research.

There are several views on what is meant by global health and global health research. In its simplest form, global health is population health on a global scale, and global health research is research which addresses the health of human populations around the globe.

Global health also refers to ‘inherently global health issues’, that is, health-determining phenomena that transcend national borders and political jurisdictions, such as globalization and climate change. In setting global health research priorities, both the burden of disease and inherently global issues should be considered.

The vision of health research as proposed by the Commission on Health Research for Development is a systems approach driven by equity, focused on country needs and priorities, and within an interactive regional and global framework.

This paper will address global health as it was defined in a Canadian consultation paper on global health research held in 2001 http://www.cghrc.ca/consult.html, that is, the health of individuals and societies in less developed, less resourced, poorer nations and regions of the world.

A major global health research issue is the inequitable distribution of research efforts and funds directed towards populations suffering the world’s greatest health problems.

This situation has been referred to as the 10/90 gap because only a meager 10% of all health research funding is being used to address 90% of the world’s burden of disease, suffered primarily in developing countries.

Because of this imbalance, there have been major attempts at redirecting research efforts and funds to the health problems of low and middle income countries.

One of the roles of health research is to ensure that the measures proposed to break out of the vicious cycle of ill health and poverty are based, as far as possible, on evidence, so that the resources available to finance these measures are used in the most efficient and effective way possible.

There are many different types of health research. At the 6^th Global Forum on Health Research, held in Arusha, Tanzania in November 2002, Dr. Gerald Keusch, Director of the Fogarty International Center, listed the scope of health research as including: fundamental discovery research, pathogenesis research, epidemiology research, clinical research, product development research, translational and adaptational research, operational research, health services research, policy research and research on health systems.

NGOs involved in health research have primarily undertaken operational and action research, but many have also participated in other types of research such as epidemiological research, social science research, product development research, translational research, health services research, and policy research.