In view of the immense potential of space technology and its spin-off benefits in the socio-economic uplift of the countries resulting in the transformation of quality of life of the society as a whole, and in order to pursue and to strengthen the multilateral cooperation among the countries of the Asia-Pacific Region in the peaceful applications of Space Science and Space Technology, three Asia-Pacific countries, namely China, Pakistan and Thailand jointly signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in February 1992 for initiating the Asia-Pacific multilateral cooperation in space technology and applications (AP-MCSTA). Under the aegis of the AP-MCSTA, a Workshop was organized in Beijing, China in December 1992. Some 120  government officials, decision-makers, experts and scholars participated in the Workshop from 16 countries including mainly Australia, China, Pakistan, India, Indonesia, Japan, Republic of Korea, Thailand and other Asia-Pacific countries and international organizations.   

The Workshop reached a consensus to actively promote multilateral cooperation in space technology and applications in the Asia-Pacific Region. For this purpose, a Liaison Committee was established in 1994, with China as its Coordinator. Other countries of the Region had also nominated their representatives in that Committee. Subsequently, the Preparatory Committee for Asia-Pacific Space Cooperation Mechanism (PREPCOM) and its Secretariat were also established in China in 1999.

In order to expand and intensify cooperation in space activities in the Region, as well as  to enhance mutual understanding among the concerned countries for strengthening the potential for multilateral cooperation,  seven more Conferences of AP-MCSTA were organized from 1994 to 2003 in Thailand, Pakistan, Republic of Korea, Bahrain, Iran, China and Thailand respectively.  These Conferences were attended by several policy / decision-makers, engineers, scientists, scholars and government officials and they had all along shown their agreement to institutionalize the AP-MCSTA Mechanism.  The participants of the 6th Conference held in Beijing in 2003 unanimously recommended to speed up the process of institutionalization of the Cooperation Mechanism.

In April 1998, a Memorandum of Understanding was signed jointly by China, Iran, Republic of Korea, Mongolia, Pakistan and Thailand for “Cooperation in Small Multi-Mission Satellite (SMMS) Project and Other Related Activities".  Bangladesh joined this Group in July 1999. Several meetings of the Joint Project Committee of SMMS have so far been held and, after completing the feasibility study, the project was started and is now at its hardware-developing phase.

Education and training in space technology and its applications is a key element for human resource development program. In order to cope with this essential requirement, several education and training courses on space technology applications were held in China for the Asia-Pacific Countries. The Asia-Pacific countries have broad requirements and cooperation objectives in the use of satellite remote sensing data in environmental studies / protection, natural resource exploitation as well as in disaster monitoring and prevention. Those education and training in these disciplines has yielded remarkable results and contribute to the promotion of capacity building for the Asia-Pacific Region. So far, with the support of United Nations ESCAP, United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UN OOSA), and the cooperation of other countries in this Region, more than 80 scientists and scholars have participated those training from over 30 Asia-Pacific countries.

This is the interesting history of  a long and sustained endeavour   made by  bringing  around  the  Asia-Pacific countries  through a modest initiation  of  activities in  space technology and its peaceful applications to  achieve the exalted goal of   institutionalization of the initiative taken in 1992 which was  ultimately  realized in 2005  ― after 14 years of its initiation ― culminating in  the  establishment  of  the Asia Pacific Space Cooperation Organization (APSCO) on 28 October 2005  with  the signing of the APSCO Convention by  eight  States of the Asia Pacific Region: Bangladesh, China, Indonesia,  Iran,  Mongolia,  Pakistan, Peru and Thailand. Then Turkey became the ninth State signing the APSCO Convention on 1 June, 2006.