AT the India-hosted BRICS summit, the Chinese President Xi Jinping dubbed the “Greater BRICS” not merely as an expanded entity but as an integrated geo-economic and geostrategic organizational platform capable of generating greater impact, deeper development outcomes and more practical cooperation. In contemporary international economic and diplomatic terms, this represents a meaningful exercise in institutional entrepreneurship, coalition-building and networked multilateralism within a fragmented, multipolar order of today.
President Xi’s strategic vision seeks to enhance BRICS’s leverage in emerging markets and the Global South through openness, mutual benefit, resilient supply chains and integrated markets, reflecting a geo-economic strategy of open regionalism, supply-chain resilience and South-South integration. At its core, “Greater BRICS” would serve as a platform for innovation, traditional-industry upgrading, emerging industries and forward-looking planning, fostering technological diffusion, accelerating structural transformation and ensuring that emerging technologies contribute to common prosperity. Its significance extends beyond BRICS members, strengthening cooperation and generating wider benefits for the international system.
Additionally, President Xi’s five initiatives consisting of human-centric AI for inclusive development, inclusive AI governance, digital public infrastructure, algorithmic accountability and AI capacity-building would prevent a widening AI divide. Moreover, inclusive trade and investment facilitation, trade-facilitation measures, e-commerce, digital trade interoperability, FDI facilitation and reduction of tariff and non-tariff barriers would further enhance strategic orientations of the BRICS. Furthermore, digital-industry cooperation, digital-industrial fusion, industrial internet, data governance, cloud infrastructure, cyber-security and interoperable digital ecosystems would accelerate modernization, digitalization and AI mechanisms among the BRICS family. Smart and qualitative manufacturing collaboration, industry 4.0, cyber-physical systems, smart factories, precision robotics, additive manufacturing and green-intelligent industrial upgrading would overhaul the existing system gearing towards greater socio-economic cooperation and financial integration. Last but not least, science and technology-driven talent cultivation, STEM mobility, human and intangible capital accumulation, joint laboratories and innovation ecosystems would further enhance BRICS’s human capital which is commendable.
These five initiatives constitute a holistic, comprehensive, participatory and productive roadmap. They aim to deepen socio-economic cooperation and institutionalize digitalization, AI, new-type modernization, quantum-secure technologies and interoperable e-commerce across BRICS. Indeed, they form a multidimensional industrial-digital compact that can accelerate inclusive innovation ecosystems, digital public infrastructure, equitable value-chain integration and open collaborative innovation.
Analytically, the initiatives also align with China’s 15th Five-Year Plan (2026–2030), including high-quality development, new quality productive forces, innovation-driven growth, modernization of the industrial system, self-reliance in science and technology, digital-real economy integration, green transition and enhanced supply-chain resilience.
They are designed to promote new economic, industrial and energy pathways; productive-capacity channels; green corridors; and quantum-technology integration. In two-level-game terms, they externalize China’s domestic developmental priorities into its foreign economic policy. Expected outcomes include higher-quality industrial cooperation, expanded green technologies, deeper human and intangible capital accumulation, improved efficiency and accelerated structural transformation. They should also enhance industrial production, global value-chain upgrading, smart industrial cluster formation, economies of scale and scope, smart factories, cyber-physical systems, digitalization, smart manufacturing, precision robotics and resilient, diversified production networks.
In modern economic and industrial-policy terms, the five initiatives provide a remedial roadmap for overcoming economic stagnation and output gaps, weak industrial production and low capacity utilization, decarbonization and global-warming externalities, climate-related disaster risks and underinvestment in human capital. They also offer a collective counter-strategy to Western notions of decoupling, de-risking, delinking, arbitrary tariff and non-tariff barriers and economic protectionism. Comparative studies reveal that the BRICS countries cover different countries, continents and communities along with distinct histories, cultures and development paths but having shared aspirations for development and revitalization, strategic autonomy and improved global governance which is commendable.
Its vast populations, natural resources, renewable-energy potential and financial weight have made BRICS a major force for global cooperation, multiculturalism and multipolarity. China has consistently played an influential role in transforming BRICS into a more diversified and determined grouping with greater weight in world affairs. The five initiatives could enable China to support a BRICS AI Open Source Zone promoting cooperation on large language models, training and an open ecosystem. They could also facilitate a BRICS special economic zone partnership through an intelligent portal and policy coordination, strengthening supply-chain stability, technological cooperation and innovation-driven development across member states.
During its 2027 presidency, China is expected to further strengthen the foundation of BRICS through genuine multilateralism and promote greater alignment of development strategies. Platforms such as high-quality Belt and Road cooperation and the Global Development Initiative, Global Security Initiative, Global Civilization Initiative and Global Governance Initiative would play a pivotal role. Moreover, the BRICS family would also initiate an alternative payment & clearing system, one currency and one commodity, energy, food and finance market enabling all the member to achieve their desired goals of socio-economic prosperity and quality industrialization in the days to come.
The writer submits that without further enhancing its political, geopolitical and geo-economics weightage the BRICS would not be in a better position to assert its peaceful agenda at the international stage. Its further strategic expansion by including Pakistan would be a value addition for its multiculturalism, economic globalization and international cooperation. In summary, the five initiatives constitute a strategic benchmark for BRICS’s future development. They offer a modern, multilateral and innovation-led roadmap for industrial cooperation, digital integration, green transition, human-capital deepening and resilient supply chains. By leveraging BRICS’s aggregate weight roughly 40 percent of global GDP it could transform into a more integrated, innovation-driven, green and resilient growth pole within a multipolar global economy.
—The writer is President, the Centre for Knowledge and Public Policy, Regional Expert: China, CPEC, BRI & World Affairs.
