New Delhi:Union Minister of Commerce and Industry Piyush Goyal on Monday during the 13th Brics trade minister meeting held under the BRICS Presidency of South Africa virtually, extended strong support to the BRICS spirit of equality, openness, inclusiveness, consensus, mutual respect and understanding.
Goyal stressed building trust among each other and expressed strong belief in small, achievable, incremental steps towards WTO Reform. He also said India wishes to see invigorated, improved, inclusive WTO as it completes three decades, talking about ’30 for 30’, which is an effort to bring at least 30 operational improvements to the WTO before the Organization completes 30 years by 1 January 2025.
The theme of BRICS this year is “BRICS and Africa: Partnership for Mutually Accelerated Growth, Sustainable Development and Inclusive Multilateralism”. Goyal touched upon issues related to WTO, Supply chain, Digitalisation, MSMEs and on the issue of Mispricing and under-invoicing in the meeting.
The Minister lauded the South African Presidency for having an ambitious Agenda and successfully completing outcome-oriented activities under the Contact Group on Economic and Trade Issues (CGETI). He extended strong support to the BRICS spirit of equality, openness, inclusiveness, consensus, mutual respect and understanding.
Reflecting India’s efforts to meet its commitments towards global efforts to fight climate-related challenges, Goyal apprised the BRICS Member countries about India’s achievement and its recent ranking at 5th position as per Climate Change Performance Index, published by German Watch. In this context, he also mentioned that India was the only G20 country in the top 10 ranks. As BRICS members are also a part of G20, he sought cooperation for significant outcomes under the ‘Trade and Investment Working Group’ of G20 under India’s Presidency.