BRICS Project Lab

Dear participants!
International relations specialists do not often have to work with global health governance issues, therefore the BRICS Project Lab team decided to help you and compiled a list of materials that may be useful for your work.

When reading, participants should pay attention to BRICS policy documents and articles related to health and biotechnology. The analysis of news items and media publications on this topic should not be neglected.

https://m.vk.com/-materialy-po-teme-zdravoohranenie

👥 Can I participate alone or do I need a team?

Everyone is to qualify for participation by choosing which of the BRICS countries they are speaking for by themselves. However, within each track there will be a team, which will create a project together and defend it in front of the experts.

🔊 Can non-Russian speakers participate?

Yes, of course. Not knowing Russian is not an obstacle, because the official languages of the event are both Russian and English.

❓How should I prepare for participation in the Lab?

Preparation is an important aspect of participation. To address this question, we've prepared a series of posts with literature you should read depending on the track of your choice.

🏢 Where will the Lab operate?

MGIMO is glad to welcome all participants within its walls, at 76, Vernadsky Ave.

What is a participant supposed to cover in the interview essay?

Everything is simple: you need to tell about yourself and why you want to participate in the track you like.

What is the form of the essay which is to be prepared?

The participants record the interview in the form of a video of no more than 2 minutes, filmed horizontally, with clear sound (it’s important!).

What is included in the forum program?

The activities of the BRICS Youth Projects Laboratory are organized within 5 tracks; the work of everyone is supervised by an expert who guides the discussion of the participants, gives comments on the track’s topics and helps with the formation of the project. After all the discussions are over, the participants from each track come up with a project and defend it in front of the experts. The best projects are sent to relevant Russian departments (the Gorchakov Foundation, Rossotrudnichestvo, Rosmolodezh, the Russia-BRICS Project Youth Office and the BRICS NKI).

⚡BRICS PROJECT LAB is officially extending the registration period ❗UNTILL MARCH 15❗

Everyone is welcome to participate in one of the five tracks of the Lab ('Science, Technology, Innovation', 'Education', 'Economics', 'Healthcare', 'Cyber security in BRICS countries') in face-to-face or online format.

📎 The event will be held on April 6-8 in Russian and English, so everyone can join in, listen to the experts during the roundtable and their speeches, as well as create their own project, which after a successful defense before the experts will be sent to the department.

📢 Please remember that when selecting the country the participant would like to represent, any BRICS country may be entered, except the one of which the participant is a citizen.

Looking forward to hearing from you!

Today we are going to tell you about the X — XII BRICS summits.

The X 10th BRICS Summit - held from 25-27 July 2018 in the South African city of Johannesburg. The tenth anniversary summit focused on economic cooperation with Africa, so several African heads of state were invited. At the end of the summit, the countries adopted a final declaration where they summarised their joint activities over the past decade and also reflected on their united approaches to the development of the association.

The XI BRICS summit was held on 13-14 November 2019 in Brazil under the slogan ⏪BRICS: Economic Growth for an Innovative Future⏩. The event discussed the development of the institutional framework of the Commonwealth, economic, cultural and humanitarian cooperation, and the development of business contacts.

The XII BRICS summit was held on 17 November 2020. During the meeting, which was held in video format due to the epidemiological situation, the leaders discussed the fight against coronavirus, the situation with international terrorism and drug trafficking, cybercrime and the terms of trade in the pandemic.

Today we want to tell you about the VI-IX BRICS summits.
The 6th BRICS summit was held on July 15-16, 2014 in Fortaleza (Brazil). At this summit, the establishment of the New development bank and the BRICS Contingency Reserve Arrangement (CRA) was announced, the latter being designed to substitute the IMF. The CRA aimes at stabilising sharp exchange rate fluctuations and ensuring dollar liquidity.
The 7th BRICS summit took place on July 8-10, 2015 in Ufa (Russia). The BRICS New Development Bank and global economic problems were the focus of the discussion. Iran joined BRICS at the 7th summit as an observer.
The 8th BRICS Summit was held on October 15-16, 2016 in Goa (India). This time, the issue of strengthening the strategic partnership between the BRICS countries topped the agenda. The talks also touched upon the Syrian peace process.
The 9th BRICS Summit took place on September 4-5, 2017 in Xiamen (China). At this meeting the BRICS leaders made ot clear they were disposed to extend cooperation. The heads of Egypt, Tajikistan, Mexico and Thailand were also invited to the summit. Thus, more developing countries with shared interests were involved in the dialogue.

Today we are going to talk about the III, IV and V BRICS summits.

At summit III, held in China on 13-14 April 2011, South Africa was represented as a participant for the first time. The leaders of the five countries discussed the most important issues relating to cooperation and agreed to interact using national currencies.

In addition, the BRICS countries expressed their views on Russia's early joining to the WTO, comprehensive UN reform and the peaceful resolution of the Libyan issue.

The IV BRICS summit was held in New Delhi on March 28-29, 2012. The meeting focused on the global economy, anti-crisis measures, as well as the situation around Syria and Iran.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev spoke at the summit about his vision of the strategic goal of BRICS. According to him, it is the gradual transformation of BRICS into a full-fledged mechanism of interaction on the most important issues of the world economy and politics.

The V BRICS summit was held in South Africa on 26-27 March 2013. Its main topic was the organisation's partnership with African countries. At the end of the summit, the Etekwena Declaration was published. The declaration assessed the current global political and economic situation and reflected common approaches of the BRICS countries on topical issues of multilateral cooperation.

The BRICS leaders met with African heads of state. During the meeting, Vladimir Putin noted that the BRICS countries are jointly defending the rights and interests of Africa and other countries with economies in transition, and are in favour of increasing their role and influence in the global governance system, in particular in international financial and economic organizations.

📍 Introducing the 'Information Security in BRICS Countries' track 📍

🌏 We all know that globalisation, through which innovative technologies spread across national borders, can be described as an essential milestone of the 21st century. Undoubtedly, information technology has an impact on all spheres of society, including the political sphere.

⏭ The BRICS Member States have recognised the crucial and positive role of the Internet in promoting economic, social and cultural development. In doing so, they pledged to continue to work together through existing mechanisms to ensure the safe, open, peaceful and shared use of ICTs on the basis of equitable participation of all states in the development and functioning of the Internet. The BRICS countries have been coordinating their views on the legal framework for information security for many years.

🖥 As a part of the 'Information Security' track, a form of case study championship is planned, where participants, with the help of experts in international information security, will be able to understand in a practical way such issues as:
🔻 implementing effective cybercrime response coordination and intensifying dialogue;
🔻 sharing approaches to security policy issues in the use of ICTs

Science, Technology, Innovation

In this track, participants are invited to analyse the BRICS countries' activities in the development of biotechnology.

Biotechnology is the process of applying living systems and organisms to practical human needs. Today, due to the technical process, biotechnology is used in various fields - industry, agriculture, medicine and others. The process of their application is very complex and is based on the achievements of modern biological science. However, the countries are actively involved in the development of the global biotechnology market.

The BRICS countries are now full-fledged participants of the global biotechnology race - they are actively developing and promoting new technical solutions in this field. They already account for a quarter of global patent applications for biotechnological inventions - fantastic progress, considering that 20 years ago this indicator did not even reach 4%.

Participants' tasks are to identify the role of biotechnology in global policy, the BRICS market place in biotechnology, create the BRICS Biotechnology Roadmap, and the Strategy for Personal Security in the Context of the COVID-19 Pandemic.

📍Track “Education”📍

🔝Education is undoubtedly one of the most important priorities for BRICS cooperation. Higher education in the BRICS countries currently is of very high quality, and has potential, but at the same time, all member countries point out the need for cooperation in this area in order to improve the quality of education and access to it.

📌Thus, in 2015, the BRICS Network University was established - an organization that includes higher education institutions from all five countries and involves the cooperation of their students in research work.
✏️The university offers six main areas of research: 🔹Energy
🔹Computer science and information security
🔹BRICS studies
🔹Ecology and climate change
🔹Water and pollution control
🔹Economics

We invite you to work on this topic and develop projects aimed at strengthening the countries' competitive advantages in this field within our track Education!

Track 'Economy'.

This track will be held under the slogan "BRICS countries on the way to sustainable development!'

The BRICS countries are currently facing several challenges that cannot be dealt with alone. These challenges include global climate change, limited natural resources, poverty, food security and access to clean water. All these things correlate with the 17 Sustainable Development Goals that were adopted by the UN. The BRICS countries recognise the UN's central role in the system of international relations.

One of the main institutions in the association aimed at implementing the SDGs is the New Development Bank (NDB).

The NDB implements projects aimed at financing infrastructure and sustainable development projects in BRICS and other developing countries. The key areas of the NDB's activities are clean energy, urban development, transport, social, digital infrastructure and many others.

Since its inception, the NDB has approved more than 70 projects in the BRICS countries.

We invite you to work within this track together!

And now we move on to the Lab's tracks📍

💪 And first up is the Healthcare track!

⏮ What's its purpose? ⏭

🧬 Participants are to analyse the work of the BRICS countries' on establishing an early warning system for epidemics as well as implementing a series of actions to jointly fight COVID-19.

⏮ Why is the analysis possible?

The BRICS Foreign Ministers have repeatedly expressed the desire to establish a BRICS Centre for Vaccine Research and Development and the need to continue working on a comprehensive early warning system for the risks of infectious diseases in the BRICS countries - according to the international health standards and leaders' declarations.

📢 Dear participants, you are invited to join the health track:

🔹 to analyse the BRICS collaborations in vaccine research and improvement;

❓Can the BRICS countries contribute to their equitable distribution❓

🔹 to explore what collaborative efforts the countries have made and are making to fight the pandemic;

🔹 to understand whether an early warning system for epidemics is effective and suitable for developing countries.