BRICS leaders will be tasked with discussing the expansion of the bloc and de-dollarisation within the grouping.
Several countries such as Egypt and Saudi Arabia have expressed their interest in joining BRICS.
This as the country is hosting the 15th BRICS Summit, which is underway in Sandton, Johannesburg.
President Cyril Ramaphosa says the presence of so many leaders at the summit in Johannesburg affirms the importance of BRICS in the global architecture.
A hot topic at the 15th BRICS summit is the expansion of the BRICS grouping:
President Cyril Ramaphosa says BRICS leaders will go on a retreat where they will give due consideration to the over 20 countries applications for entry into the bloc.
“A number of countries some of which are represented here are seeking to be part of this BRICS family and we appreciate that it goes to show that the BRICS family is growing in its stature importance and also in its influence in the world and we will be taking into account the various countries’ desires to be part of BRICS.”
Another topical issue is the use of the dollar, with Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, speaking virtually and through an interpreter, saying that efforts to de-dollarise are gaining ground. “The share of import and export US dollar operations within BRICS is declining last year it was only 28.7%. In fact this summit is to discuss the entire range of issues relating to the transition to national currencies in all areas of economic cooperation in terms of our five nations.”
Meanwhile, Brazil’s President Lula Da Silva, also through an interpreter, says the country is back in Africa after a decline in trade over the past few years.
“It is unacceptable that in 2022 Brazil’s trade with Africa has dropped by one third when compared to 2013 when it was almost 30 billion dollars trade from Africa still corresponds to 3 and a half percent of Brazil’s foreign trade there is still room to grow.”
Meanwhile, India has committed to the transfer of digital skills to the bloc.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi says, “India has the cheapest per gigabyte cost today in India from street vendors to large shopping malls all use UPI that is Unified Payment Interface today India is the country with the highest number of digital transactions in the world countries such as UAE, Singapore, France are also joining this platform there are several possibilities of working on this platform with BRICS countries also.”
