As the collaborative research between the Bangladesh Institute of Research and Rehabilitation in Diabetes, Endocrine and Metabolic Disorders (BIRDEM), Dhaka, The University of Dhaka (DU), the University of Uppsala (UU), and the Mahidol University (MU), Bangkok, on antidiabetic plant materials was developing during 1990-1991, it was felt appropriate to organise a workshop in the field for exchanging views and expertise. With the financial assistance of the International Program in the Chemical Sciences (IPICS), the main sponsor of the collaborative research program, and the International Foundation for Science (IFS), a workshop was held in January 1992 in Dhaka. The workshop generated great enthusiasm among the scientists from home and abroad and it was suggested that efforts should be made to organise a wider forum for exchanging experiences in the field of antidiabetic plant research and addressing the problem in a . more concerted manner. The First International Seminar on Plant Materials as a Source of Antidiabetic Agents organised in January 1994 was a result of such efforts initiated jointly by BIRDEM and DU and supported by their scientific coworkers in Sweden and Thailand. As in the case of the workshop, the First Seminar was primarily financed by the IPICS and IFS. The First International Seminar on Plant Materials as a Source of Antidiabetic Agents was able to draw eminent scientists working in the field from 14 different countries besides a large local response. It was felt during discussions between the collaborating scientists and the representatives from the IPICS and IFS that a broad forum in the form of a Network may be formed for coordinating the research efforts in the field of antidiabetic plant materials. A draft proposal for the formation of ANRAP was prepared by the Dhaka Group which was circulated among the concerned scientists and donors. The proposal was widely supported by everybody and was highly appreciated at the Asian Coordinating Group in Chemistry (ACGC) meeting in Melaka, Malaysia in June 1994. The meeting recognised the importance of such a multidisciplinary concerted move for finding out remedy, for a particular incurable disease like diabetes, from plant sources, and adopted an unanimous resolution supporting the formation of ANRAP A draft ANRAP constitution was prepared by the Dhaka Group and was adopted with appropriate modifications at the First Executive Meeting of the Ad hoc Committee of ANRAP held in Dhaka an 7-8 January 1995.