Executive Summary Knowledge Synthesis Report
South Sudan, officially the Republic of South Sudan, is a country emerging from two decades of conflict and became an independent state on 9 July 2011. As a result the conducting and publishing of health research for the country has not been a priority. The amount of published literature before the conflict is minimal and would have covered Sudan as a whole rather than focusing specifically on Southern Sudan. Since the signing of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) in 2005 there has been a huge influx of International Non Governmental Organisations (INGOs) into Southern Sudan, many of which have a focus on health. The South Sudan Ministry of Health has also firmly established itself over the past few years, and many systems and policies have now been put in place.
Unlike other countries where long established functioning health care systems have allowed for active health research projects and the collection of reliable data for informative decision making, South Sudan is only now in a position to begin supporting health research.
While compiling the information for this knowledge synthesis report, it became clear that although much is known about the state of health systems in South Sudan through people’s experience and personal knowledge there is little published research. Therefore there are considerable knowledge gaps in all areas related to health research and in order for sound evidence-based policy making to become the norm, more active reputable health research needs to be carried out.
A huge step towards achieving that goal has now been taken through the establishment of the Research and Health Systems Development Directorate and the Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) Units have begun to take a leading role in research projects in South Sudan.
