| 1968 | ACRA was born on 25th May from an encounter between two Lombard groups of different nature, on one hand a trade union, on the other Tecnici Volontari Cristiani (voluntary Christian technicians,) who shared a strong interest in international solidarity. From their activity sector - the rural one – has come the acronym Associazione di Cooperazione Rurale in Africa. The first country of intervention was Chad, a spontaneous and natural choice considering the direct knowledge of operating personnel in that area. The ten founding members started immediately the management of an agricultural project in Chad and the recruitment of new members in order to meet the needs of self-sustainability and raise awareness in Italy.
During the first decade of its activity ACRA managed just one project in Chad, but that experience allows the association to give an essential contribution to the establishment of the bases of voluntary NGO in the Italian cooperation. |
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| 1973 | ACRA gained the sustainability approval by the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. | |
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| 1979 | With the Cooperation Law No. 38 of 1979, the opportunity to tap into funding from the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs allowed ACRA to expand its intervention capacity from one to several small projects in Chad. | |
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| 1983-84 | The meeting with other Italian groups, which have their bases in Latin America countries (Nicaragua and Bolivia), provides an opportunity for ACRA to open to new territories. The area of intervention was always rural and consisted not only in supporting agricultural activities, but also in supporting local communities, in processing and commercialization of products and in promoting instruments of participatory democracy within the management of common needs of the grassroots communities. In parallel, ACRA initiated to have contacts with local partners in Senegal, which allowed the development of new and different projects compared to those implemented in Chad. These projects involved the participation of grassroots organization with a more mature and articulated structure and benefited from the democracy in the country. |
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| 1987 | During the Partners' Meeting, Chad, Senegal, Bolivia and Nicaragua were defined as priority areas of intervention. Because of this choice and of activity proliferation in these countries, ACRA required the establishment of local coordination structures. | |
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| 1994 | Following the crisis of ministerial financing, ACRA launched the collaboration with the European Union and modified its decentralized structure, transforming the country coordination (Chad, Nicaragua, Bolivia and Senegal) in area coordination in order to open its intervention in neighboring countries (Cameroon.) | |
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| 1997 | The sharing of some ideas with an Ecuadorian association born in Italy encouraged ACRA to implement a microcredit project in Ecuador. That project was followed by other projects in the field of local product commercialization and of natural resources preservation and enhancement (especially water.) | |
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| fine ’90 | The activity of development education in Italy, which until then had found expression only in educational interventions in schools, expanded its range coming to work on communication, training, education and implementation of projects realized together with Italian and European networks concerning the rural education and food safety. Moreover, ACRA implemented projects financed by the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the European Union for public and civil society awareness on development integrated modalities and for exchanging knowledge between North / South and South / North in matter of education. | |
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| 2002 | The participation in the UNA consortium, which had a coordination in Kenya, permitted the understanding of the development dynamics in that country and especially in the neighboring Tanzania | |
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| 2005 | Being part of the Lombardy Region NGOs Association brought ACRA to play an important role in the reconstruction of a specific area in Sri Lanka and in the implementation of projects in different countries (such as Argentina, the Dominican Republic and Brazil) through consortia with other NGOs of the Lombardy Region. Furthermore, with the launch of a program for the valorization of traditional medicines, promoted by a consortium of five Italian NGOs – of which ACRA is the prime contractor - started ACRA's experience in Mali. | |
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| 2007 | ACRA started a new project in Burkina Faso, concerning a dynamic development of the cross-border reserve in Burkina Faso, Niger and Benin, in consortium with other two Italian NGOs. | |
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