3rd BRICS Summit – Sanya, April 14, 2011

On April 14, 2011, President Dilma Rousseff will participate in the 3rd BRICS (Brazil, Russia, China and South Africa) Summit, to be held in the Chinese city of Sanya, alongside the President of China, Hu Jintao, the President of Russia, Dmitri Medvedev, the Prime Minister of India, Manmohan Singh, and the President of South Africa, Jacob Zuma. The previous Summits were held in Yekaterinburg (June 2009) and Brasília (April 2010).

The Summit will mark the admission of South Africa to the group, which will extend the geographic representation of the mechanism in a moment when the financial system reform is sought worldwide, as well as a greater democratization of global governance in general.

The five leaders will hold talks on economic, financial and trade affairs, on issues related to development, such as the Millennium Development Goals, on the international situation, on climate change and also on the cooperation within the bloc, in areas such as agriculture, energy, statistics and cooperatives.

The Summit was preceded by the BRICS Think Tanks Seminar (Beijing, March 24 and 25). The following events will also be held: Meeting of BRICS Development Banks (April 13) and the BRICS Business Forum (April 13 and 14), both in Sanya.

The acronym that names the group, originally formulated in 2001 by Goldman Sachs, focus on the economic and financial fields, but its scope of action has addressed trade affairs and political issues.

Between 2003 and 2010, the BRICS countries’ growth represented around 40% of the world’s GDP growth, and their GDP, calculated in terms of purchase power parity, reached US$ 19 trillion, which corresponds to 25% of the world economy. Between 2003 and 2010, the trade flow between Brazil and the BRICS countries increased 575% (exchanges went from US$ 10.71 billion in 2003 to US$ 72.23 billion in 2010). Trade among BRIC countries went from US$ 38 billion in 2003 to US$ 143 billion in 2009 and to US$ 220 billion in 2010 (estimate).