BRICS+ impact: plaudits and brickbats

• South Africa hosted a productive three-day summit of the BRICS group - Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa - at the end of August, which enhanced the standing of the African powerhouse without unsettling key Western partners.
• The biggest policy announcement from the summit was an agreement to invite six new members to the bloc - Argentina, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the UAE - with their enrolment set for January 2024.
• An expanded BRICS has impressive numbers in terms of its share of the global economy, international trade and the world’s population. However, its collective economic clout will be constrained by internal divisions and the lack of formal institutional structures.
• Concerns that the BRICS summit would adopt an anti-Western stance proved unfounded, and pre-summit talk of de-dollarisation made little headway - although there is clearly potential for settlement of more international transactions between BRICS partners in their local currencies.
• The summit theme - ”BRICS and Africa: Partnership for Mutually Accelerated Growth, Sustainable Development and Inclusive Multilateralism” - put the focus on Africa and could help to create new trade, investment and financing opportunities for existing and new BRICS members.

The latest annual summit of the five major emerging economies that make up the so-called BRICS bloc was held in Johannesburg in late August. All national leaders were in attendance except the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, who sent his foreign minister instead, and the five states agreed to a major expansion of the bloc by inviting six new members - Argentina, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the UAE - to join in January 2024. With the exception of Argentina, we expect these countries to accept the invitation.

The countries invited to join reflect the desire of individual BRICS members to bring allies into the club. Argentina is a logical inclusion and was Brazil’s pick, while Egypt and Ethiopia - Africa’s third and second most populous countries respectively - will give the continent a stronger voice and their inclusion was championed by South Africa. Saudi Arabia and the UAE will provide extra financial clout and are key oil producers, which were possibly China’s and India’s respective choices, and Russia is likely to have been the main advocate for the inclusion of Iran. Pre-summit reports pointed to a larger number of new BRICS applicants - including Indonesia and Bangladesh - but not all confirmed their interest, and details of the selection process are murky. Further expansion seems probable in the future, depending on interim developments.