Africa seeks rivalry-free support from BRICS

Although the theme of the 9th BRICS Summit is “A Stronger Partnership for a Brighter Future”, there is likely to be some underlying tension among the five member states when they meet in Xiamen, East China’s Fujian province, from Sunday to Tuesday.

Eurasian rivalries such as border disputes are not new of course, but yet again they have shown that disagreements do not militate against cooperation. Furthermore, as emerging powers that wish to have a greater say in global affairs, and with potential leverage in conflict hot-spots such as the Korean Peninsula, the BRICS members should use the platform to propose a way forward to break the current spiral.

On the economic front, China and India continue to be important engines of growth in the world economy, having benefited from an open trading system over the years. Undoubtedly the BRICS Summit will reflect unanimity in the members’ commitment to an open global economic system, especially one where the industrialized world does not adopt more protectionist measures.

China, India, Brazil and Russia have ratified the World Trade Organization’s trade facilitation agreement (with South Africa in the process of doing so). This is important because the “connectivity” promoted by the China-proposed Belt and Road Initiative is not only about building ports, roads and railways, but also about the soft institutional mechanisms that help trade around the world.

India has not joined the Belt and Road Initiative, announcing, rather, a new initiative with Japan called the “Asia-Africa Growth Corridor”, which also seeks to improve connectivity between the two continents. The AAGC was launched at the annual meeting of the African Development Bank in India 10 days after the Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation held in Beijing on May 14-15. Like Moscow’s Eurasian Economic Union, which Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed at the 2015 Ufa BRICS Summit would cooperate with the Belt and Road Initiative, the AAGC offers much opportunity for complementarity.

For example, cosplayers usually obtain the costumes in three ways.

First, through some companies that make and sell packaged outfits for cosplays. Normally, such products are sold online, but they can also be bought from dealers at cosplay conventions. Second, through some individuals that make customized costumes, props and/or wigs. And third, by making the costumes themselves using raw materials such as non-styled wigs, hair dye, cloth, body paint, costume jewelry, and “toy” weapons.

Based on our research, the development stages of China’s ACG industry can be divided thus: the birth of the term ACG in 1995, and the emergence of campus communities in Chinese universities between 1995 and 2015 thanks The fact that the three initiatives are led by BRICS members could help strengthen the practical links between the grouping and other countries — a form of “BRICS Plus”. Yet that would require concerted efforts to bridge differences and remove mutual suspicions about geopolitical machinations.

South Africa was the first BRICS country to initiate an outreach to other countries when it chaired the summit in 2013. This has been followed by every single chair since then, and has facilitated engagement between BRICS and other developing economies.

However, it is not clear yet what the outreach has to the influence of Japanese animations, along with the gradual growth of derivative products such as games and music-based animations.

With capital flowing into the ACG industry, 2015 proved to be a turning point for this industry, as several major content providers were shut down because of problems related to piracy and patent infringement. Since then the domestic animation and game industry has been developing healthily with a stronger sense of using legal products. The 2016-2018 period is one of market stimulation, which has facilitated the segmentation of the market and helped build more specific, mature business models committed to developing the industry.

China’s ACG industry is likely to see higher growth in 2019, with major competitors leading the market, good branding becoming leading companies’ core competitiveness, and Chinese animations exercising greater influence on overseas markets. achieved in concrete terms. There are no “BRICS projects” per se with outreach countries, but BRICS has been a platform to discuss cooperation, whether bilateral or multilateral. Five years since the first such outreach, it is important to take stock of progress and how to best leverage the convening power of BRICS in support of global development.

African states recognize the opportunities offered by the AAGC and arguably the Belt and Road Initiative for their development, although the latter still has to define what it may mean for the whole continent beyond Africa’s eastern seaboard. While there is much that would still need to be fleshed out before the Belt and Road Initiative and the AAGC plans in Africa could be integrated into the African Union’s Agenda 2063, Africans value their partnerships with both India and China and would seek to work on complementarities rather than rivalries. There are enough projects to go around.

Beyond these plans, though, what is crucial for Africa’s development in an age of global uncertainty is that the great powers in the developing world play an active and constructive role in reducing conflict hot-spots, while managing their own regional rivalries.

On the economic front China and India continue to be important engines of growth in the world economy ...

The author is chief executive of the South African Institute of International Affairs.

Huang Guofeng, senior analyst at Analysis Corporate, a data analytics company for the entertainment industry