FOREWORD
BRICS brings together five major emerging economies, comprising almost 42% of the world population, 30% of the land area, having 24% of the global GDP and 16% share in the global trade. BRICS deliberates on issues relevant for all developing countries and in that sense represents the voice of the developing world. BRICS has positively contributed towards the global discourse on a range of issues such as multilateral cooperation, sustainable development, climate change, development finance and reform of the multilateral system.
2021 is a landmark year for BRICS as it has completed 15 years. Over the last decade and a half, there have been numerous achievements of BRICS. It is the only plurilateral grouping with a Bank of its own and a financial safety net in the form of the Contingent Reserve Arrangement.
India has assumed the BRICS Chairship in 2021 and has strived to strengthen intra-BRICS cooperation across three pillars viz. political and security; economic and fi nancial; and cultural and people to people exchanges, under the overall theme of ‘BRICS@15: Intra BRICS Cooperation for Continuity, Consolidation and Consensus’
Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi has stated that people should be at the heart of BRICS cooperation and has called for enhancing people-to-people exchanges among citizens of the BRICS countries.
P2P interactions, while ensuring that the citizens of the BRICS countries get a better understanding of the grouping, have signifi cantly contributed to enrich intra-BRICS dialogue. BRICS Academic
Process is one such Forum that has served as a knowledge bank for various BRICS inter-governmental interactions and has institutionalised engagement among experts from BRICS countries.
