Nearly every nation went through tough times in the past couple of years. Some due to recession, some due to terrorism and some due to natural calamities. With each other’s help, the countries still managed to go ahead with their plans undeterred. There are many groups of nations which actively take part in development of member countries. Be it OPEC or G7 or even unofficial G2 (The U.S & China), the group acts as a separate entity on its own. Similar one such group is BRIC. Of late, the world has started taking notice of the new BRIC in the wall, and there are some reasons for that. In the light of recent events, this group is emerging as one of the most powerful entities there are.
BRIC stands for Brazil, Russia, India and China. The term was first coined by Jim O’Neill of Goldman Sachs in 2001. In the view of Goldman Sachs, BRIC will be four most dominant economies by the year 2050. This encouraged these countries to come together and work for a common goal. Strong on development path, these countries sure have lot to offer to the world in many fields. BRIC is aimed towards concrete decisions, coordinated efforts and also building a safer, healthier and fairer international order. The first BRIC summit was held in Russia in 2009. It paved a way for the countries to come together and take the stage. The second summit proved the degree of commitment the member countries have to offer for the development of new world order. In the words of Russian president Dimitri Medvedev “the meeting showed that the BRIC format is maturing and allows us to not only coordinate our efforts but to also make concrete decisions.”
The second BRIC summit was organized in Brazil on April 16, 2010. The meeting was aimed towards building a better world economic order in the post crisis period. The strong formulation in the summit can get US worried as this group may challenge the western hegemony. As the group accounts for almost 20 percent of global GDP, the world has to take notice of what are the major concerns of these countries. All the member countries laid emphasis on the reform of institutions such as IMF, World Bank and Bretton Woods institute. BRIC also calls for a faster long-term recovery of world economy.
There results of the actions of BRIC are already visible only with two summits. The collective approach has helped BRIC to force a redistribution of 5 percent of voting shares in the IMF and 3 percent in the world Bank in favor of emerging and developing countries at the G20 summit in Pittsburgh last year. This clearly shows that these countries want the world to take notice of the contribution of developing economies of the world and create a new world order, which gives dominance to developmental aspirations of common people. With increased participation of India and Brazil in the UN, one can only hope that the goals of BRIC will surely be on their way to completion. This will make sure that the developing economies including India will benefit largely from it. As honorable Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan sees it-“world wants India to succeed and this country should take advantage of it”.
The writer is a correspondent of Youth Ki Awaaz.