The Research Institute in Birobidzhan was founded by joint efforts of the JAR government and the USSR FEB AS Presidium.

Pavel A. Minackir, D.Sc. in Economics who had created an authoritative scientific school of regional economic development in the Russian Far East, was appointed as a director-organizer of the established Institute.

By the USSR Council of Ministers resolution of May, 26, 1990 «On social-economic and national-cultural development of Jewish Autonomous Region for the period until 2000» signed by N.I. Ryzchkov, the Council of Ministers Chairman, the newly established institute was given a different name used to present: the Institute for Complex Analysis of Regional Problems (ICARP).

Since 1992 the Institute had been run by Felix N. Ryansky, D.Sc. in Geography. According to his program of the Institute Development, the region was considered as a complex system in its relation and interaction of natural, economic and social factors. The most important task was finding ways and methods for rational environment management.

On April, 28, 1997, Professor Anatoly A. Vrublevsky, D.Sc. in Geology, was elected a director of the Institute. Coupled with the integrated approach to investigations, geologically oriented research was especially supported.

Corresponding Member of Russian Academy of Sciences EfimY. Frisman has been holding the post of a director since May, 22, 2002. The Institute scientific direction that includes complex analysis and modeling of the development processes in regional natural and nature-economic systems is actively promoted. There are the investigations in the traditional for the Institute geological orientation as well as the intensified economic-geographical, ecological, and floristic and fauna research.