The 8th BRICS summit is hosted by India. The summit will be held at Goa in India, from 15th to 16th October 2016. It will be attended by the heads of state or heads of government of the five member states Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.

What to expect 8th BRICS summit Goa from this year?

• The government of India has laid out a five point agenda for the 2016 BRICS Summit. Those five points are institution building, implementation, integrating, innovation and continuity.
• The proposals and discussions from the 2015 Summit should be of high priority at the 2016 BRICS Summit
• The further strengthening of the New Development Bank would be a priority of the 8th BRICS Summit hence, as work begins on the initial approved projects. Of further interest will be to see if there is any cooperation or partnership announced with China’s Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, which has a much wider international scope, stretching even to Europe.
• Trade will also be on high priority at the summit. Russia’s trade and economy has been struggling, in part due to the United States/European Union imposed sanctions. Brazil’s economy has been tanking due to the political turbulence that resulted in the impeachment of President Dilma Rousseff.

  South Africa might end up seeing their credit rating being downgraded to junk status amidst controversy surrounding President Jacob Zuma and other politicians. China, while comparatively in a better condition, has also seen a slowing economic growth rate. And while India’s economy has been growing healthily of late, there is still room for ample improvement.

• Discussions on healthcare, sustainable growth, climate change and a shift to cleaner, greener energy will also be there.

Leaders of BIMSTEC member countries have been invited by India, who is a member of both BRICS and BIMSTEC, to hold a joint summit with the BRICS, for latter’s regional outreach. In addition to BIMSTEC, leaders of Afghanistan and Maldives have also been invited.

About BRICS:

BRICS is the acronym for an association of five major emerging national economies: Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. Originally the first four were grouped as “BRIC” (or “the BRICs”), before the induction of South Africa in 2010. They are all leading developing or newly industrialized countries. However, BRICS countries have significantly slowed down with South Africa only growing 1% in 2015 similar to the 1.6% a year from 1994 to 2009, Brazil in its worst recession since the 1930s by some measures, Russia in a recession as oil prices tailspin and sanctions weigh, and China’s slowdown is set to be a drag on global growth and is reported to be the slowest in the last 25 years. Since 2009, the BRICS nations have met annually at formal summits. Russia hosted the group’s seventh summit in July 2015. India is going to host the BRICS conference in Goa in 2016.

As of 2015, these five countries represent over 3.6 billion people, or half of the world population; all five members are in the top 25 of the world by population, and four are in the top 10. The five nations have a combined nominal GDP of US$16.6 trillion, equivalent to approximately 22% of the gross world product, combined GDP (PPP) of around US$ 37 trillion and an estimated US$ 4 trillion in combined foreign reserves.