NEW DELHI, September 8. /TASS/. The upcoming BRICS summit in New Delhi on September 12-13 will become a key stage in the institutional consolidation of the expanded composition of the grouping and its transformation into a real force for global development, Indian expert in international relations Malika Pandey told TASS.
"I expect the New Delhi summit to be less about one dramatic announcement and more about giving institutional shape to the expanded BRICS," she said. "The summit should advance a BRICS that is not merely an alternative voice but an alternative capacity in finance, trade, technology and development. The significance of BRICS will not lie in how effectively it contests the old order, but in how convincingly it builds additional choices beyond it," the expert added.
She noted that "the grouping already represents 49.5% of the world's population, around 40% of global GDP and 26% of global trade, while intra-BRICS merchandise trade has risen thirteen-fold from $84 billion in 2003 to $1.17 trillion in 2024." "The economic weight is already there; the real question is whether BRICS can convert weight into leverage. You cannot indefinitely run a twenty-first-century global economy through a twentieth-century distribution of institutional power," she told TASS.
Pandey identified four main areas where practical results should be expected, namely "deeper development financing through the New Development Bank; progress on national-currency and cross-border payment mechanisms; resilient supply chains and greater intra-BRICS trade; and cooperation in AI, technology, energy and critical infrastructure."
As examples of successful integration, the expert noted the coordination of "the Jaipur Consensus, guiding principles to improve MSME access to credit, a 2026-30 Global Value Chains Action Plan, principles for digitally delivered services, and progress towards a BRICS Economic Partnership Strategy 2030."
The expert paid special attention to energy security, pointing to the need for closer coordination among BRICS countries as the largest producers and consumers of energy resources against the backdrop of geopolitical instability. "Because BRICS brings major energy producers and consumers into the same framework, it could examine long-term supply arrangements, strategic reserves, local-currency energy trade and other mechanisms to reduce exposure to extreme price volatility," she noted.