Vitality of BRICS stems from its answering call of the times

When Goldman Sachs economist Jim O'Neill coined the term BRIC in 2001 predicting that the world's fastest-growing emerging market economies－Brazil, Russia, India and China－would come to dominate the global economy by 2050, they accounted for about 15 percent of the global GDP. In 2010, South Africa was added to the group to form BRICS, and the five countries' combined share of the global economy is now about 24 percent.

That rise is mainly due to the remarkable growth of the Chinese economy, which surpassed France, the United Kingdom, Germany and Japan to become the world's second-largest economy during that period of time. Nonetheless, their cooperation and exchanges as a group have constantly intensified since the first BRIC summit was held in Yekaterinburg, Russia, in 2009.

With the normalization of the ministerial-level meetings under the BRICS framework, along with other mechanisms and channels, the collaboration among the five countries now extends beyond their trade ties to encompass finance and innovation, green development and public health, and cultural exchanges and security.