A national malaria gene bank was set up in February 2009 at the Medical Scientific Institute (MWI), with financial support of the Amazon Malaria Initiative (AMI/RAVREDA). It is used to store blood samples of all malaria positive patients in Suriname as dried blood spots.

The Surinamese NMGB is the first characterized and ranked Plasmodium gen storage in the region and creates the possibility to answer future questions via retrospective molecular biology malaria research.