International laboratory Accreditation Conference (ILAC) was established in 1977, as an international forum to discuss the accreditation of testing and calibration laboratories and inspection bodies.

By 1997, however, the Plenary Meeting had become too big to be used as a place for substantial discussion. ILAC was reorganized as a formal international organization, International Laboratory Accreditation Cooperation, with a membership consisting of Accreditation Bodies who accredit testing and calibration laboratories and inspection bodies.
Over the years, ILAC published various technical guidance documents for the application of requirements for the competence of testing and calibration laboratories (ISO/IEC 17025) and for the requirements for accreditation bodies accrediting conformity assessment bodies (ISO/IEC 17011) to support the harmonization of activities among Accreditation Bodies and to promote active use of accreditation by governments and others, support for development of accreditation system, active trade between countries.

Asia Pacific Laboratory Accreditation Cooperation (APLAC) is an organization for cooperation of Laboratory Accreditation Bodies within the Asia Pacific region, and was established in 1995 at the initiative of Australia.
As with PAC (see the section �gIAF PAC�h above), APLAC is recognized as a Specialist Regional Body in the APEC context and is invited to attend meetings of the APEC Sub-Committee on Standards and Conformance (SCSC).
Full members from Japan are JAB, IA Japan, JCLA and VLAC.

In early 1997, APLAC conducted peer evaluations of its established members, and in October 1977 established a Multilateral Mutual Recognition Arrangement, with seven bodies from six countries that had passed the evaluation process.
These original MRA members were A2LA (USA), CNLA(Taiwan), HOKLAS(Hong Kong), IANZ(New Zealand), NATA(Australia), NVLAP(USA) and SINGLAS(Singapore). JAB was approved as having achieved MRA status in 1998 and JAB, IA Japan and VLAC are members of the APLAC MRA now.