In March of 1982, at the request of the Vice President of External Relations (EXT), a task force composed of senior Bank officers was established to define the Economic Development Institute's (EDI) longer-term objectives and develop specific proposals for achieving them. The EDI task force was to review the objectives of EDI to identify the measures which need to be taken both in EDI and within the Bank to improve the services which the Institute is providing to Bank member countries. To accomplish this the task force conducted extensive consultations with the Bank and EDI staff, EDI Fellows, and governmental representatives from various regions.

The task force was chaired by Shahid Husain and L. Peter Chateney, who was then the EXT Advisor for the International Relations Department (IRD), was named the secretary of the task force. Later in 1982 Chateney was named the acting director of IRD, and Kreszentia Duer replaced him as secretary. The report of the task force was presented to the Managing Committee of the Bank in late 1982 and to the Board of Executive Directors in 1983.