Asean-Japan Centre (AJC) - the Asean Promotion Centre on Trade, Investment and Tourism - reached its 40th anniversary on May 25. AJC is an intergovernmental organization established in 1981 and has been promoting exports from the Asean Member States to Japan while revitalizing investment, tourism, as well as people-to-people exchanges between the Asean Member States and Japan.
AJC was established based on the "Fukuda Doctrine" announced in 1977 by the then Japanese Prime Minister Takeo Fukuda. Originally opened with the founding member countries of the Asean (Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand) and Japan, with other five countries (Brunei Darussalam, Vietnam, Cambodia, Lao PDR, and Myanmar) joining later on, all 10 Asean Member States and Japan are now the members of the Centre.