Overwhelming response to the Prime Minister’s proposal to make Africa

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s proposal to make the African Union a permanent member of the G-20 has received an overwhelming response from the group, Indian G-20 Sherpa Amitabh Kant has said.

In an interview with PTI, the chief negotiator noted that India was “very hopeful” that the African continental body would find a permanent position within the G-20 during New Delhi’s chairmanship of the grouping.

Last month, Mr Modi wrote to the leaders of the world’s 20 biggest economies asking the African Union to become a full member of the grouping when it next summits in New Delhi in September.

The proposal was formally included in the draft leaders’ statement at the third G-20 Sherpa meeting held in Hampi, Karnataka, July 13-16.

The African Union (AU) is an influential organization made up of 55 member states that make up the countries of the African continent.

The Sherpas held four rounds of in-depth discussions during the meeting to shape the leaders’ declaration that will be adopted at the New Delhi summit.

Kant said the prime minister’s proposal to grant G-20 membership to the AU has received wide support and India’s chairmanship of the grouping is largely aimed at benefiting the global South, including the African continent.

“Our whole document is actually designed based on the meeting that the Prime Minister had with the 125 countries at the Voice of Global South Summit. What came out of that is the basic premise that our document (draft leaders’ statement) is based on,” he said.

Therefore, one of the main problems was that the Prime Minister wrote to all the leaders for the African Union to become a permanent member. We proposed this at the Sherpa meeting, Mr. Kant said. I am happy to say that we had an overwhelming response to this proposal from the Prime Minister of India during the third round of the Sherpa meeting, he added.

The G-20 operates on the principle of consensus and any dissenting voices at the top of the leadership can create difficulties, officials said.

Mr. Kant said India’s priorities for the summit were sustainable growth, rapid implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), digital transformation and green development, among others.

The chief negotiator said India’s position was that resources should be provided to developing countries for both the SDGs and climate action.

On the issue of “climate justice”, he said that climate finance is a very critical issue. “If you’re trying to be ambitious on climate action, there has to be simultaneous action on finance. It’s impossible for the developed world to ask us to be ambitious on climate action and then cut climate finance; that’s not possible,” he said.

Mr. Kant also stressed the need for private sector loans to meet the challenge.

“And that’s not the balance sheet of the multilateral development banks. But the balance sheet of the world has to be used to really push resources,” he said.

Mr. Kant noted that there is no shortage of money in the world. “There is $350 trillion available with the private sector, $150 trillion is available with institutional investors and the private sector with pension funds,” he added.

“But they won’t invest where the risks are very high. Now the challenge is that you have different risks for different countries,” he said while pointing out the different interest rates in different parts of the globe.

Reflecting on the challenges faced by developing countries or countries in the Global South, Kant said that the international financial architecture is weighed against emerging markets, even if growth comes from them.

“This growth is coming from emerging markets due to young demographics, whereas there is an aging population in the western world and this has been happening over the last decade and a half,” he said.

“Growth in the developed world is declining and growth in emerging markets is increasing. So if growth in emerging markets is increasing due to young demographics, you need more resources to flow into emerging markets,” Kant said.

“But the opposite is happening,” he regretted.

Mr. Kant said that India will push to find solutions to these problems.

In January, India hosted the Voice of the Global South summit with the aim of highlighting the issues and challenges facing developing countries.

The African Union is considered the premier group representing the voice of Africa. He strove to ensure the progress and economic growth of African nations. It was officially launched in 2002 as the successor to the Organization of African Unity (OAU).