In 1960 Jane Goodall began her pioneering research at the Kakombe Valley in Tanzania. In 1967 the Gombe Stream Research Center (GSRC) was founded to coordinate the study of the wild chimpanzee populations. Gombe National Park was not established until 1968. GSRC is located on the eastern shore of Lake Tanganyika, 15km north of the town of Kigoma and is accessible only by boat. The chimpanzee research program at GSRC is the longest continuous research program of any species worldwide. The wealth and importance of the data collected on the chimpanzees and baboons at GSRC cannot be overstated; data collected in Gombe National Park has changed the definition of humanity and has provided a window for innovative scientific data collection methods.

Field research at GSRC has focused on the behavior of two communities of eastern chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii); the Kakombe community and the Mitumba community which was habituated much later in the early 1990s. Studies of several troops of baboons (Papio anubis) also began at GSRC in the early 1970s as well as much shorter studies of red colobus monkeys (Colobus badius tephrosceles).

The chimpanzee research program at GSRC continues to provide ground-breaking scientific research on demographic patterns, male politics, hunting, culture, and mother-infant relations of the local chimpanzee communities. Research has been concentrated in both the central and, more recently, northern portions of Gombe National Park, although it is also known that there is at least one unhabituated community of chimpanzees currently living in the southern area of the Park. The total population of chimpanzees within the boundary of Gombe National Park has been estimated at roughly 85-90, although no official census has been conducted to date. While not receiving equal media attention, JGI has also been conducting baboon research at GSRC for over two decades.

The wildlife and vegetation of Gombe National Park faces serious conservation threats due to the limited chimpanzee gene pool, human encroachment and the existence of ‘island’ habitat constraints. As such, it is important that the research programs at GSRC are coupled with conservation and community development programs for the communities surrounding the park. To do this, JGI initiated the Lake Tanganyika Catchment Reforestation and Education project (TACARE) in 1994. The program was designed as a pilot project to address poverty and support sustainable livelihoods in villages around Lake Tanganyika while arresting the rapid degradation of natural resources, especially in the remaining indigenous forest. The program focuses on community socio-economic development, and offers training and education in sustainable natural resource management.