Since the fifties of this century, national as well as international conferences on chemical engineering organized in Europe and overseas have included special sessions devoted to mixing. Demands mixing on research and development in the chemical and food industries at the beginning of the 1970*s gave rise to specialized conferences.

     During the First European Conference on Mixing, which was held in Cambridge, UK, in 1974, experts from several European countries decided to set up a Preparatory Committee for a Working Party on Mixing of the European Federation of Chemical Engineering (WPM of the EFCE). This Committee met at the occasion of the European Conference on Mixing in the Chemical and Allied Industry held in Mons, Belgium, in 1977 and it was proposed to set up the Working Party.

     The establishment of the WPM was confirmed, in accordance with the proposal of the Science Advisory Committee of the EFCE, by the Executive Committee and approved by the General Assembly of the EFCE in 1977. The inaugural meeting took place in Prague, Czechoslovakia, on the occasion of the 6th International CHISA Congress in 1978. The Secretariat was run on an honorary basis by the Czechoslovak Society of Chemical Engineering and was located at that time at the Prague Institute of Chemical Technology. Since 1986 it has been located at the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering of the Czech Technical University in Prague. Prof. J. Skřivánek was appointed the first Chairman of the WPM, Dr. I. Fořt serving as Secretary. When J. Skřivánek resigned in 1987, Prof. P. Ditl overtooked the chairmanship of the Working Party.