Pak applies for BRICS, seeks Russia’s support

Pak applies for BRICS, seeks Russia’s support

Subject: IR

Section: Internal organisation

Context: Pakistan, which has applied for the BRICS membership, is looking forward to joining the group of developing nations under Russia’s presidency in 2024.

Details:

The bloc currently includes China, the world’s second-largest economy, as well as Brazil, Russia, India, and South Africa. Six new members —Saudi Arabia, Iran, Ethiopia, Egypt, Argentina, and the United Arab Emirates— will be added to the bloc in January 2023. Pakistan is hopeful about joining BRICS with these countries.

The next BRICS summit is scheduled for October 2024 in the city of Kazan in Russia.

BRICS:

• BRICS is an acronym for the grouping of the world’s leading emerging economies, namely Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.
• The term BRIC was coined by Jim O’ Neil, the then chairman of Goldman Sachs in 2001.
• The first BRIC summit took place in the year 2009 in Yekaterinburg (Russia).
• In 2010, South Africa formally joined the association making it BRICS.
• The BRICS Leaders’ Summit is convened annually.
• The Chairmanship of the forum is rotated annually among the members, in accordance with the acronym B-R-I-C-S.
• Together, BRICS accounts for about 40% of the world’s population and about 30% of the GDP (Gross Domestic Product), making it a critical economic engine.
• During the Sixth BRICS Summit in Fortaleza (2014) the leaders signed the Agreement establishing the New Development Bank (NDB), headquartered in Shanghai.
• Fortaleza Declaration stressed that the NDB will strengthen cooperation among BRICS and will supplement the efforts of multilateral and regional financial institutions for global development thus contributing to sustainable and balanced growth.
• Considering the increasing instances of global financial crisis, BRICS nations signed BRICS Contingent Reserve Arrangement (CRA) in 2014 as part of Fortaleza Declaration at Sixth BRICS summit.
  • The BRICS CRA aims to provide short-term liquidity support to the members through currency swaps to help mitigating BOP crisis situation and further strengthen financial stability.
  • The initial total committed resources of the CRA shall be one hundred billion dollars of the United States of America (USD 100 billion).