On 20 June 2010 SORC opened its new public library with a small celebration.

Since January 2010 SORC offers research grants to Ethiopian scholars enrolled in postgraduate programs of Ethiopian universities. It is designed to encourage research that involves extended fieldwork in South Omo Zone.

Professor Katsuyoshi Fukui, who died suddenly last year at the age of 64, was a leading figure in the anthropological study of southern Ethiopia and the main architect of a remarkable growth in Ethiopian studies in Japan since the 1980s.