Following the 15th annual BRICS summit, which was held in Johannesburg, South Africa last week, the bloc of five major emerging economies announced the admission of six new members.
Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Ethiopia, Argentina and the United Arab Emirates are set to formally join the group on January 1, 2024 to expand the bloc’s footprint in the Global South and grow its economic and political clout on the world stage, establishing a real counterweight to the Western-dominated G7.
As Statista's Felix Richter notes, the new bloc will represent roughly 46 percent of the world population, account for 29 percent of the world’s gross domestic product in nominal terms and 37 percent of global GDP at purchasing power parity.
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“We shared our vision of BRICS as a champion of the needs and concerns of the peoples of the Global South. These include the need for beneficial economic growth, sustainable development and reform of multilateral systems,” South African president Cyril Ramaphosa said at a press briefing announcing the outcomes of the summit. He also indicated that the addition of the six new members is just the beginning of the bloc’s expansion process.
“As the five BRICS countries, we have reached agreement on the guiding principles, standards, criteria and procedures of the BRICS expansion process, which has been under discussion for quite a while,” he said. “We have consensus on the first phase of this expansion process, and further phases will follow.”
Interestingly, the new additions don’t move the needle too much in either category, as the new BRICS which will continue to be dominated by China and India, both in terms of population and economically. Combined, the six new members will account for roughly 10 percent of the group’s aggregate GDP, as Saudi Arabia is the only trillion dollar economy among the new entrants.
By Zerohedge.com
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The BRICS group is already heralding a New World Order away from the unipolar system led by the United States into a fairer and more equitable multipolar one and also a new global financial system away from the US dollar based on the yuan and other major currencies.
Moreover, the BRICS countries are working on creating a special currency for trade transactions and a system for financial settlements between them away from the dollar. And by inviting major oil powers like Saudi Arabia, UAE and Iran to join their organization, they accelerate the decline of the dollar as a reserve currency and also as an oil currency.
The major beneficiaries will be the petro-yuam, the Indian rupee, the Saudi riyal, the UAE dirham and the Russian ruble.
All these developments will accelerate the global drive for de-dollariztion. For peoples of the world, the dollar has become synonymous with sanctions, US hegemony, political arrogance, oppression, conflicts and wars and US self-interest. In a nutshell, it has become the ugly face of capitalism.
America’s economy is broke with record trade deficits, record budget deficits, a weak banking system and inflation that is about to run out of control. The reckless money printing won’t save the US economy. The game is over.
By 2030, the yuan will be the top reserve currency of the world and the petro-yuan the dominant oil currency along with a few others. By then the US dollar would have lost one third to one half of its value.
Dr Mamdouh G Salameh
International Oil Economist
Global Energy Expert