Summary:
- South Africa’s chairing of the BRICS bloc must be seen as an opportunity to advance continental developmental aspirations.
- BRICS supports and encourages South-South relations, and thus serves as an addition and alternative to opportunities that are generally provided by western economies.
- The developmental programmes of Africa – most of which revolve around agriculture – require partnerships to be realised, and BRICS could be used to achieve some of these goals.
- African agricultural production and marketing systems need to be modernized through the adoption of technological innovations, to overcome challenges and for further improvements.
- BRICS countries have used digitisation of the agricultural sector to create opportunities for market, credit, finance, and input procurement. African countries can learn from these experiences to overcome some challenges of information asymmetry and improve transparency and overall competitiveness in the market.
- Such improvements require sectoral investments, distribution channels, and international trade opportunities.
- BRICS has some trade complementarities with the continent. It has furthermore created investment channels through the New Development Bank, which may unlock opportunities for shareholding African members.
