About us

In 1992 a group of Air Reserve officials held a meeting in Lahr, Germany, with the aim of learning from the experiences of the International Air Reserve community. Attending this meeting were: Canada, France, Germany, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.

 

Various discussions were held about the institutionalization of the informal meeting. At the 6th IARS 1998, discussion about having a secretary started; at the 7th IARS 1999: discussion about enlarging the circle of the participating countries was initiated; at the 9th IARS 2001, discussion about the way the meeting would be hosted; at the 10th IARS 2002, the IARS Office was officially established and the concept “Terms of reference” was used for the first time.

 

The Secretary of the IARS Office started unofficially in 2002. The role was conducted by a reserve officer from the Netherlands. Officially the IARS Office was created with the Letter of Intent (LOI) signed for the first time by the participating countries in 2008. The term of the office is 3 years. The Netherlands prolonged the first period of 3 years, until 2011. At 2012, Switzerland took over for the second term, followed again by the Netherlands in 2018. The successor for 2023 was announced as the UK at the 26th IARS, in September 2022,

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The chairman of IARS rotates amongst the IARS members. The host of the annual symosium is the chairman of that year. Official point of contact for the IARS is the Secretary of the IARS Office. Each participating country has its own point of contact.