At the APEC leaders’ meeting in 1995 in Osaka, there were amongst the issues raised, the need to facilitate the mobility of qualified persons among the member economies. Consistent with the Osaka Action Agenda, the meeting of 18 member economies of the APEC Human Resource Development Ministers in Manila in January 1996, urged the acceleration and expansion of project initiatives on mutual recognition of skill qualifications.

The APEC HRD Working Group that met in Wellington, New Zealand, agreed to an Australia initiation on the project, focusing on professional engineering accreditation, recognition and development.

At the first Steering Committee meeting held in May 1996 in Sydney, Australia, a consensus was reached to proceed with a comprehensive survey on professional institutions and societies, registration of professional engineers and engineering education and development. The results of that would form the framework for the best practices in professional engineering accreditation, recognition and development.

http://www.apec-emf.org/