by MARWAAN MACAN-MARKAR
BANGKOK, Apr 17, 2011 (IPS) – Despite political differences among member countries, BRICS has set its sights on global trade talks to assert its weight. Its declared aim: to secure economic benefits for developing nations.
The World Trade Organisation (WTO) has, not surprisingly, been singled out as a venue to demonstrate the collective strength of the informal coalition of major emerging economies across three continents – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, the BRICS nations. All member countries but Russia are members of the Geneva-based WTO.
This emerging centre of economic power – seen by some analysts as a potential counterweight to dominant industrial nations from North America and Europe, and to an economic power such as Japan – will not have to wait long, following the one-day third annual BRICS summit in the southern Chinese beach resort Sanya on Thursday this week.
The WTO is due to circulate draft texts Apr. 21 of the contentious issues over the stalled Doha round of negotiations to agree a single global trading regime. Trade representatives from the developing and developed worlds have been at odds over a raft of issues, including the heavily subsidized agriculture sectors in the United States and the European Union.
“Brazil, China, India and South Africa remain committed and call upon other members to support a strong, open, rules-based multilateral trading system embodied in the World Trade Organisation and a successful and comprehensive and balanced conclusion of the Doha Development Round,” declared the closing statement of the BRICS summit.
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From 2001 – the year when Goldman Sachs economist Jim O’Neill coined the acronym BRIC to highlight the rise of four major emerging economies (minus South Africa then) – till 2010, trade amongst BRICS nations has risen 15 times. It is now estimated to be 230 billion dollars.
By 2050, some analysts say BRICS is poised to become the dominant global economic player, dethroning the long dominance of the G-7, the club of richer, industrialised nations including France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Britain, the United States and Canada.
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