BASC meaning in General ?

The Berkeley APEC Study Center (BASC) is a research center at the University of California, Berkeley. Created in 1996 in response to an initiative by U.S. President Bill Clinton, the center undertakes research, disseminates information and facilitates discussion on APEC-related issues involving political, economic and business trends in the Asia-Pacific region.

The Berkeley center is part of the APEC Study Centers Consortium (ASCC), a network of over a hundred research institutions and university centers across twenty APEC member economies. In addition to the Berkeley center, sister APEC centers are headquartered at Columbia University, Brown University, the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, the Taiwan Institute of Economic Research, Hong Kong University, Kobe University, Nankai University, and the University of Indonesia. For the past several years, the Berkeley center has served as co-chair of the U.S. Consortium of APEC Study Centers.

Since its establishment, the center has published over a dozen volumes related to trade and economy in the Asia-Pacific region. It sponsors conferences, symposia, and visiting lecturers. In addition to participating in ASCC conferences in Australia, Peru, Singapore, and Japan, the center has hosted conferences pertaining to the rise of China, the economic resurgence of Russia, Industrial Policy in the Post-Financial Crisis Era, and Mega Free Trade Agreements such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) on the UC Berkeley and Stanford University campuses.