Its original name was Spanish Agency for International Cooperation (AECI), but Royal Decree 1403/2007, of 26 October, amended its Statute and gave AECID its current name.

AECID is a public agency under the aegis of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, via the Secretariat of State for International Cooperation (SECIPIC).

The Agency is in charge of designing, implementing and managing development cooperation projects and programmes, whether directly, with its own resources, or through collaboration with other national and international bodies and non-governmental organizations.

[1] According to the OECD, Spain’s total ODA (USD 4.2 billion, preliminary data) increased in 2022, mostly due to in-donor refugee costs.

Another responsibility is to coordinate development policies with Spain's other General State Administration bodies, and with other bilateral and multilateral agencies and organizations, especially within the European Union and the United Nations system.

This institution complemented the organization’s policy regarding grants for the higher education of those countries' future leaders and professionals, and it has been open uninterruptedly to this day.

Two other self-governing bodies were also consolidated and integrated into AECI at the time of its creation: the Spanish Arab Institute of Culture (IHAC), which had been functioning since 1954, and had been provided with a legal and operational structure in an Act of 13 February 1974, also as a self-governing institution of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs; and the National Commission and the Cooperation Office with Equatorial Guinea (1981).

The instruments for carrying out the mandate assigned to AECID are principally established in the Master Plan for Spanish Cooperation, the Annual International Cooperation Plan, and the sector-based and country-based strategies, as well as in agreements and conventions with public and private entities and organizations; like the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), approved by the United Nations, have been added.