The control of malaria by chemotherapy, the use of pesticides, and public health measures has been curtailed by the increasing spread of drug resistance of the parasite, especially Plasmodium falciparum, while increased tolerance of the mosquito vectors to the older insecticides has exacerbated the global malaria problem by facilitating the return of infection to areas recently freed from the disease. The search for new chemotherapeutic agents and investigations aimed at a better understanding of existing antimalarials is an expensive and time-consuming task, usually only undertaken in the more sophisticated laboratories. The successful in vitro cultivation of the blood, tissue and sporogonic stages of the malaria parasite could quickly and easily provide the means to examine compounds against the target species, or an acceptable experimental model. It should allow for a better understanding of the mechanism of parasite invasion, biochemistry, physiology, chemotherapy, drug resistance, and immunology.