Forum: Trade, exchanges can unlock BRICS potential
The foreign ministers of BRICS met in Beijing a few days ago to review the journey of the group and chat about the path forward, as they do every year. As these important BRICS leaders meet, they will be pondering the group’s multi- and bilateral areas of success and hindrances as well as put a premium on future bilateral priorities.
A few things immediately spring to mind about where their energies should go in an attempt to nourish the tree so that it can bear everlasting fruits in terms of both the future survival and success of the BRICS grouping.
It becomes important to acknowledge that there are huge expectations among both the BRICS nations and in the international community that the BRICS grouping will speedily bring about immense changes.
Expectations articulated in the annual resolutions of the BRICS presidencies, which are fed by an assortment of meetings like the BRICS Academic Forum and the various meetings of either economy and trade or foreign ministers, must be balanced between being overly zealous and realistic.
At the same time, it is important that decisions emanating annually be audited against previous summits to avoid overlaps and with a view to emphasize and reinforce important decisions.
Were we to serve as advisors to the BRICS foreign ministers, we would beg them to consider the following two points as imperative:
First, audit and analyze the achievements of the BRICS grouping to date. Acknowledge that which could have been done differently for better results.
Second, the future of BRICS hinges even more than before on the lubrication that should be provided by the bilateral and multilateral agreements facilitated by the BRICS foreign ministers.
Let us introspect snippets of these two elements. The question worth asking is: What has the BRICS grouping achieved? Could those things be achieved better – more efficiently and effectively?
In the area of education and culture, BRICS established the BRICS Network University. Thus far the network has not been fully operational nor funded at levels comparable to individual BRICS members’ bilateral agreements with other countries of the north like the USChina academic and cultural exchanges or South Africa- German cultural and academic exchanges.
Instead, the future generation of BRICS leaders continues to flock to the universities of Europe and America, thereby exchanging and learning northern cultures, rather than exchanges among BRICS members. Education and cultural exchange are the best methods over the long term for cementing nations’ relations and socioeconomic partnerships.
While there have been numerous attempts including commitments by heads of state on the importance of establishing a “common market area,” these articulations have not been met by practical application. It is still equally and perhaps even harder to facilitate trade among BRICS nations than has historically been the case.
Trade conditions remain un- harmonized and disparities among member states abound. Without solving this deficiency, the BRICS nations will not be able to maximize benefit from each other’s development trajectories.
Indeed, the debates of BRICS revolve around the economy and trade, with cursory attention to other areas like education. Even so, the role of foreign ministers in the facilitation of the social and economic derivatives of BRICS economic goals is central to its success.
To unlock its potential, BRICS foreign ministers should facilitate the ambitions of “strengthening intraBRICS trade” by unlocking a common visa system for the BRICS nations that will facilitate movement within and across member nations with ease. These conditions already exist between some BRICS nations and other nations outside the grouping but rarely within the grouping.
Working with the New Development Bank and the ministers of trade and economy facilitates a common currency market. To this effect, the eighth presidency alluded to the development of a road map to implement a long- standing idea for the promotion of currency swaps, settlement in local currencies and other instruments across BRICS.
The road ahead is long and winding for the BRICS grouping and there are as many expectations and demands as there are cynics. The BRICS foreign ministers however should firmly assert their grip on the levers of this grouping to negotiate a stronger and brighter future of the
group.
The author is deputy dean of Business and Management Sciences at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology. He is former director of the South Africa BRICS Think Tank. opinion@ globaltimes. com. cn