A shot in the arm for African finance

Countries across the continent set to embrace arrival of $100 billion BRICS bank

Decoding China's investment in Africa

Setting in train Africa's railways

The recent unveiling of the planned BRICS Development Bank is being hailed as a huge leap forward for the developing world, and a significant milestone in cooperation between the five major emerging economies.

The Brazil summit, which agreed on the bank's creation earlier this month, convened under the overall theme "Sustainable Solutions for Inclusive Growth".

But just what are the implications for Africa of setting up this $100 billion Shanghai-based development bank?

Amidst an ongoing international clamor for reform of the global geopolitical system, establishing a financial institution to focus on providing developing nations with an alternative source of funding to Western-dominated financial institutions has been applauded politically as a solid first step in the creation of a potentially more symmetrical global polity.

When the idea of the new development bank was first mooted in Durban, South Africa last year, the wording of its draft constitutional document was unequivocal.

It stated clearly that the five country members - Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa - had directed their finance ministries "to examine the feasibility and viability of setting up a New Development Bank for mobilizing resources for infrastructure and sustainable development projects in BRICS, and other emerging economies and developing countries".

The creation of such a development-organization-for-all was certainly not lost on observers.

No lesser a commentator than Jim O'Neill - the former chairman of investments at Goldman Sachs, who is credited with coining the acronym "BRIC" in the first place - has disputed the worthiness of South Africa as a BRICS member, pointing out that its economy falls well short of the other four on all fronts.

However, he does accept that the invitation and retention of South Africa is a worthy illustration of solidarity, and that Africa must have a seat at this important geopolitical organization.

It is no coincidence that the rollout of the new BRICS bank came barely a month after the African Union endorsed a plan for the establishment of the African Monetary Fund.

However, some have concluded that even with the creation of the bank and the AMU, economic representation of developing countries still falls well short, compared with that of developed nations, within the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.

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