Federation of Inter-Asian Philately (F.I.A.P)

The Inter-Asian Philatelic Federation, abbreviated as F.I.A.P., is a nonprofit and non-political federation of philatelic federation in Asia and Australia.

It all started in the early 70s when a group of enthusiastic philatelist from Asian and Australian having one common desire of forming one big philatelic family. A preliminary conference was thus held in Singapore on December 16, 1972 for two days, and a protem executive committee was born. Dr. Soichi Ichida (Japan) was elected as Chairman, M.S. Khorshid (Iran) as Vice-Chairman, Koh Seow Chuan (Singapore) as General Secretary, Dr. A R Kandiah (Malaysia) and S.Suryadarma (Indonesia) as Committee Members. John Gartner (Australia), Christopher D’ Almada (Hong Kong), Charles Stewart (Thailand) are the other founder of F.I.A.P.

Drafting of F.I.A.P. constitution, inviting membership applications and holding many meetings during the period 1972-1974 were main task of the founding members. F.I.A.P. was at last, officially registered in Singapore on September 14, 1974 with Indonesia, Iran, Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand as the founding member countries.

FIAP is a young international philatelic organization, but she acts as a powerful lighthouse guiding the Asian members to the route to organized philately. Prior to the formation of FIAP in 1974, organized philately is practically unheard of in Asia, with the exception of Japan, India and Iran. It is through the never-ending efforts of our founding members that places Asia in a most respectable status in the world of philately today. Todate, FIAP has thirty members.