JOHANNESBURG - The BRICS brand is a well-recognised global brand that shows a very high degree of follow-through in implementing resolutions, according to Dr Petrus de Kock, the general manager for research with Brand South Africa.
He was speaking at the BRICS summit held in Johannesburg yesterday.
“Our research shows that the BRICS brand is growing in importance as more and more summit resolutions are being implemented with 70percent of resolutions being implemented.”
BRICS Business Council chairperson Dr Iqbal Survé said yesterday in his welcoming address at the start of the BRICS 10th annual summit that the International Monetary Fund agreed with this assessment of the importance of BRICS, as it forecast that the five BRICS countries would add more to the global economy than the seven advanced economies of the G7.
De Kock said Brand South Africa research had explored how the increased formalisation of intra- and inter-BRICS interactions, the establishment of institutions such as the BRICS New Development Bank and increased interaction on platforms such as the Business Council had led to the development of the BRICS’ collective image.
“The development of the BRICS brand takes place in a post-global financial crisis world, characterised by growing protectionism, trade wars and turbulent political change. The developments in the global economy and geopolitical environments play a major role in driving the search for strengthened, deepened and institutionalised BRICS interactions.
“BRICS nations have been bucking these global trends of anti-globalisation and counter-integrationist discourses. As a result, they have anchored their own economies through the BRICS partnerships,” said De Kock.
Dr Survé noted that the New Development Bank had committed to more loans in the past three years to BRICS countries than the World Bank had committed to BRICS countries in the past 74 years.
A Brand South Africa research report captured findings related to three specific aspects of the BRICS brand, namely the emergence of BRICS as an institution in the global governance arena; how the institutionalisation of BRICS contributes to the development of the BRICS brand, and how the BRICS brand presented a unique case of compound soft power or the multilateralisation of soft power.
“The BRICS countries connect 42percent of the world's population and are establishing new institutions and hosting conversations to create a world where bricks are there to build bridges of mutual understanding,” said De Kock.
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