On 24 August, Mr Denis Manturov, Minister of Industry
and Trade of the Russian Federation, chaired a Meeting of the BRICS Industry Ministers
via videoconference.
The Meeting saw the presence of Mr Carlos Da Costa,
Special Secretary for Productivity, Employment and Competitiveness at the
Ministry of Economy, the Federative Republic of Brazil, Mr Som Parkash,
Minister of State for Commerce and Industry of the Republic of India, Mr
Yaqing Xiao, Minister of Industry and Information Technology of the People’s
Republic of China, Mr Ebrahim Patel, Minister of Trade, Industry and
Competition of the South African Republic and Mr Li Yong, Director-General of
the UN Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO).
The experts discussed priorities in the development of
industrial cooperation in the BRICS countries during the coronavirus pandemic,
including joint development and the broad introduction of green technologies
and technologies of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.
Mr Denis Manturov presented Russia’s initiative on
creating a Center for Industrial Competencies for the BRICS Countries as a new
stage in developing cooperation under the Partnership on New Industrial (Digital)
Revolution (PartNIR).
“The Center would speed up the development and
integration of leading-edge technologies. Industrial companies, branch
associations and the related government bodies in our countries will become the
ultimate beneficiaries of the Center. In fact, it will become a new point of
growth in BRICS industrial potential and will strengthen the position of this
grouping in the global market,” said Mr Manturov. He also noted that UNIDO
could play a special role in these efforts.
“We invited the UNIDO Secretariat to participate in
the development of competencies in the most advanced high-tech sectors. It is
possible to do this with Minimal involvement of resources will be required with
the creation of a virtual project office. UNIDO expertise would allow all of us
to better identify the key trends on the global industrial agenda and find
niches we can fill,” Mr Manturov said.
Among the priority areas of the Center's activities is
an exchange of experience on best available practices on the industrial track, the
development of joint startups, including with the involvement of the New
Development Bank, and an efficient search for partners for industrial
companies. In addition, the Center would be designed to develop a dialogue on
technical regulation and standardization, including the adoption of mechanisms
on recognizing documents on conformity assessment.
“In this area, Russia is currently upgrading a network
of 36 test laboratories for assessing the conformity of products to
international standards. As a result, they would be able to make a
comprehensive assessment of products to establish whether they meet the
requirements of the targeted markets. We are interested in involving
specialists from the BRICS countries in this work and see great potential for
cooperation with our partners in this area,” Mr Manturov said.
Official website of the Russian BRICS presidency: https://eng.brics-russia2020.ru/