The Foundation for Advanced Studies on International Development (FASID) was set up in March 1990. Its primary functions are to conduct education and training of a new generation of Japanese development professionals, and research on international development. FASID was established as a non-profit organization with the legal status accorded jointly by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the then Ministry of Education, Science and Culture. It was founded with the active support and cooperation by the then Japan Federation of Economic Organizations (KEIDANREN).
The history of FASID goes back to the mid-1980s, when Shintaro Abe, then Minister for Foreign Affairs, commissioned a private advisory group to study means of improving the effectiveness of Japanese development cooperation. The advisory group presented its recommendations in 1985; among them was a proposal to establish an "International Development University" (tentatively named). Subsequently, a conference was organized to discuss this proposal. In 1987, the basic concept of an "International Development University" was submitted to Tadashi Kuranari, Minister for Foreign Affairs at that time. In Fiscal Year 1988, the Japanese Government allocated funds for study of an advanced educational and research institute for development cooperation. Using these funds, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs commissioned the study and organized a committee composed of academics and practitioners, which submitted a detailed report to Hiroshi Mitsuzuka, then Minister for Foreign Affairs.
This report called for a three-step approach to the establishment of an "international development university". The first requirement, it said, was to broaden the base and raise the level of development studies and development research in Japan. In order to accomplish these goals, the report called for the establishment of a core organization. This was the genesis of FASID.
The structure of FASID is based on another of the report's recommendations, that the new "core organization" pool resources of the government and private sector. The following presents a detailed chronology of the formation of FASID and its major activities to the present.
